


Year One

by SeeEmRunning



Series: Sam at Hogwarts [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Supernatural
Genre: Abusive John and Dean, Book 1: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Crossover, Gen, Only at the very beginning, Pre-Series, Sam at Hogwarts, Young Sam Winchester
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-06
Updated: 2014-06-06
Packaged: 2018-02-03 16:50:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 24,823
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1751732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SeeEmRunning/pseuds/SeeEmRunning
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam Winchester was a hunter's kid - right up until there was a knock on the door to tell him he was a wizard.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue: Summer

**Author's Note:**

> This came about largely as a result of various posts on my Tumblr. This is only the first in a series of 7-8 works, all of which will closely follow established HP canon events, though not necessarily their outcomes.

John and Dean Winchester were proud to say they were perfectly good hunters, thank you very much. They were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or abnormal; they just didn't hold with such nonsense. In fact, they'd made quite a name for that family stamping that sort of nonsense _out._

The youngest Winchester, Sam, had also been raised a hunter. He'd learned the truth at a very young age, when strange things happening around him had prompted his father to first test him for supernatural influences and then resort to beating and starving him whenever something strange occurred. Dean looked on with pity but didn't interfere, though he did patch his younger brother up in the bathroom and talk at him quietly about _Why couldn't he just be better? Dad wouldn't be so hard on him if he was better._ Sam had done his best to be 'better', but things just kept happening. He had learned around six that he could control it, to an extent, but the longer he went without using it the more violent the results would be.

On his seventh birthday, after six months with no incidents and so no beatings, John gave him a sawed-off shotgun and began his training. He went on his first hunt, a woman in white, at eight. By the age of ten, he had hunted a werewolf, three shifters, a skinwalker, a kitsune, five poltergeists, and countless ghosts. He, too, grew the Winchester reputation.

One day in late April, his father foisted him off on Caleb ("A birthday present," John had called it. "A show of trust," Dean claimed. Sam got the feeling they just didn't want him around) and Sam got the drop on the rougarou they were hunting. It was his eleventh birthday.

"Caleb?" Sam said quietly as they watched the rougarou burn.

"Yeah, kid?"

"If I tell you something, can you keep it a secret from my dad?"

"It's not dangerous, is it?"

"No. Nothing like that."

"Then sure. Go ahead and tell me."

The flames danced over the body of what had been an ordinary man just three days ago when they'd begun tracking it and Sam said, "I don't want to be a hunter."

"I don't blame you," Caleb said, taking him completely by surprise. "You're a kid. You shouldn't be risking your life every day for no other reason than you're told to."

"Really?" Sam said, looking up at him hopefully.

Caleb smiled down on him. "Really. And Sam? If you don't want to do this - if you aren't heart-and-soul into hunting - well, nobody can make you. You'll be more a hindrance than a help if you don't want to be here."

"I'll get people killed," he said softly, his dad's words echoing in his ears.

"Maybe," Caleb said. "Or maybe you'll make plans to get out, and keep those on the back burner until you _can_ get out, and that will keep you focused on the hunts you _do_ take."

"You think?"

"I think." Caleb wrapped an arm around Sam's shoulders and tugged him close. "And maybe, when you're older, you'll find a balance. Maybe you'll find that hunting things and keeping people safe isn't so bad when you've got a normal life to keep you steady."

"I don't want to be normal," Sam said. "I want to be _safe._ "

Caleb squeezed him. "I know, kid. I'm sorry. Just hang in there. It does, eventually, get better. Even with your asshole of a dad."

Sam tucked the conversation away deep inside his chest, a pearl nobody would ever excavate. He'd told a hunter he didn’t want to hunt and he'd been understood.

They stretched out next to the body to wait for the flames to die down. Sam fell asleep and didn't wake up until Caleb nudged him - the fire was out. They shoveled dirt overtop the former man and went back to the car. "How about some ice cream?" Caleb suggested.

Sam's face split in a brilliant smile.


	2. Diagon Alley

It was official. Sam hated everything.

The nightmare had begun with a knock on the door in mid-July, just after they'd finished hunting a coven. Innocuous enough, all things considered. What had _not_ been innocuous was the knocker's chartreuse robes, letter written on parchment, or explanation of why so many things had gone wrong around Sam. Dean and John had both tried to shoot the woman, and the next thing Sam knew, they were tied on the floor with glowing green ropes.

The woman turned to Sam. He could either come with her or stay with John and Dean until school started, but law required he attend school beginning in August. Sam remembered the beatings and being starved. His father told him that if he left he could never come back, that they would hunt him down until he remembered who he was, and that if they couldn't save him they would have to kill him. Dean stayed silent, clearly content to let their dad take the lead but begging Sam with his eyes to stay. The witch eventually gagged John and told Sam it was up to him. He chose the option least likely to get him killed for being a freak and went with her, taking a pistol and shotgun, ammo for each, three knives in silver, iron, and bronze, his too-small clothes, and a picture he'd been given for his sixth birthday.

None of the schools in North America wanted to take a hunter's kid who was a hunter himself, and John was marginally less likely to cross an ocean than to cross the continent. Sam wasn't fluent enough in Spanish or Portuguese for South America to be an option, so for the safety of all involved, a deal was worked out with Britain. Papers were signed, meetings were had, and a week after Sam left it was official: He'd be going to Hogwarts, in Britain. The American Legislature and British Ministry put him up in a hotel right outside Diagon Alley, which was apparently wizarding London's major shopping center. He was given a stipend to buy his supplies and food for the summer, so when he got his shopping list he was able to enter Diagon Alley, find the shops, and quietly purchase secondhand supplies. 

The first thing he bought was his wand. The wandmaker - Ollivander, according to the sign - had first measured him magically, then muttered and puttered around and given him dozens and dozens of wands to try. Sam had waved them all; some had no reaction, some exploded the lights, and a memorable two set the counter on fire. Ollivander seemed to get happier as time went on, the damage to his shop mounted, and more wands piled up in the 'rejected' stack. Sam eventually found a wand that worked for him - phoenix feather in ornately-carved hazelwood, thirteen inches, moderately flexible. "An unusual combination," Ollivander told him. "Best suited for divination and dueling. Four Galleons."

The wand was his most expensive, but by no means only, purchase. Sam examined the discount robes at a place called Madam Malkin's and asked her what the patches meant. Harried and overworked, she didn't explain beyond, "They're the Hogwarts houses," but told him if he brought them up she'd take the patches and trim off. He got the clothing a size too big, knowing he'd grow into them and he needed to make them last as long as possible. He also bought a pewter cauldron, glass vials, brass scales, and a beginner's potions ingredients kit at the Apothecary, where a man behind the counter chatted to him about potions that boosted the libido. Sam escaped with his secondhand materials as soon as possible, face flaming red. He found what seemed to be a thrift store, where he bought a telescope for six of the little bronze coins that looked very much like pennies.

The bookstore tempted him in more ways than one, but he stuck to the assigned books only. He found all of them in the 'used' stack in various conditions, which told him that Hogwarts hadn't updated their books in quite some time. He also picked up a pack of old-fashioned parchment, ink, and quills, which were apparently preferred over pens.

Shopping done, he returned to the Leaky Cauldron. There was some of the frankly ridiculous money left over, which he saved in the bottom of his duffel to buy meals for the next five weeks. If prices stayed steady, he'd be able to afford survival rations, but if they went up he'd have to steal, probably from normal London.

The picture moving in its frame on the wall reminded him of his only impulse purchase: a cheap silver frame from the thrift shop. He had just one picture, of his entire family in the month before the fire. They'd all been dressed up for Halloween, back before the holiday was just a reason for his father to drink. Dean had been a firefighter, his mother a Glinda the Good Witch, his father the Tin Man. Sam had been put in an orange onesie with a jack o'lantern face on it and a pumpkin hat. It was the only thing he had of his mother. He fit the picture into the frame and set it on the bedside table.

Life quickly became lonely. Sam had once been used to being left on his own for long stretches of time in a motel room, but in recent years that time had dwindled down to almost nothing as he went on more hunts. Shopkeepers watched him suspiciously. He went out into normal London occasionally, to look around, but there was only so much to be done in a city over the course of a summer with long, idle days when he was watching every penny. Or Knut, as the case may be.

To that end, he read his textbooks once, twice, a third time for good measure, and practiced the spells inside with a determination stemming from a need to make up for his background. Every time he succeeded was a rush in his ears and phantom echoes of his father screaming that he was a freak; every time he failed was a surge of fear that he would be sent away.

He had eventually resorted to stealing day-old newspapers from the trash cans and combing through them for signs of supernatural phenomena. He found a possible haunting on the south side, got to a library, and confirmed. The cemetery was outside the city, in walking distance for someone in Sam's shape, and so he slung a bag with a shotgun, rock-salt shells, and a small shovel over his shoulder and headed out one night in early August.

He got cut up and bruised. It was damn difficult to dig a grave and shoot the ghost when she appeared alone, especially for an eleven-year-old kid. Still, he got it done, and he walked back to the hotel through the worst parts of London at 2 AM. Nobody bothered him - he'd learned that trick years before, how to walk through a crowd yet stay completely invisible. Maybe it was magic, or maybe it was just plain stealth. Sam honestly wasn't sure, now that he knew magic was something he could use.

After that, he found a hunt every week. The adrenaline pumping through his veins reminded him of his earlier life, and he had found a way to both hunt and stay safe. He stole shotgun shells from one of the only places in London that sold them and replaced the shot with rock salt at night.

Also in early August, there was a big hullaballoo downstairs. Some celebrity came through - he'd defeated both 'You-Know-Who' and 'He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named', from what Sam could gather of the half-conversations around him. He caught a glimpse of the kid once; he was around the same age as Sam, dark black hair, bright green eyes, a lightning-bolt scar, and an expression of complete confusion.

Sam shoved off the wall and walked away. There was a poltergeist six streets away and he had hex bags in his pockets.


	3. The Journey from Platform 9 3/4

September first same slowly. Sam packed the night before, not that there was much _to_ pack; his school supplies had all been consolidated into his duffel and one bag from the robe shop. On the morning he was due to leave, he picked up his duffel, waved to Tom the bartender (who never seemed to sleep), left through the front door, and walked to the train station. He arrived just before ten. Now, of course, he had to find the platform. Nine and three-fourths, according to his ticket.

He found platforms nine and ten and stared at them, confused. Was there a trick to it? Did he need to touch a specific brick with his wand, the way he'd begun doing after his first day in Diagon?

A brunette teenager leaned against the wall between the platforms - and vanished. He blinked rapidly. Had he seen that right? He must have. He could move without being seen - maybe there was a similar charm on the wall? Except instead of not being seen, it was a charm to see something else?

Nothing ventured, nothing gained, he thought. If it didn't work, he could always ask the next people he saw go through.

He needn't have worried: he went through fine. There was an entire platform back here, with a marvelous black-and-red steam engine waiting to come to life. It was almost empty - apparently most people waited to get here until it was a little closer to departure time.

He embarked rather nervously. He'd never been on a train before; was there a seating order? The cars marked "PREFECTS' CARRIAGE" was clearly not meant for him, but what about the rest? Did older students sit in the front or back?

He settled near the middle of the train, picked out a textbook at random, and started to reread _Bewitching for Beginners_ for the fourth time.

Around 10:45, the compartment door slid open and a round-faced boy clutching a toad poked his head in. "C- Can I sit with you?" he asked timidly.

"Yeah, of course," Sam said, shutting his book. "I'm Sam Winchester."

"I'm Neville Longbottom," the other boy said, dragging his trunk in behind him and shutting the door. "What House do you think you'll be in?"

Sam blinked at him. "House?" he asked blankly, recalling Madam Malkin saying something about houses when he'd bought his robes. Neville tried to lift the trunk and overbalanced, falling backward into the seat next to Sam. The trunk landed on top of him, driving the air from his lungs. Sam dragged the trunk off him and was just lifting it for him when the door opened again.

"Can I sit here?" a new voice - a girl's voice, Sam absently noticed - asked.

"Sure," Neville wheezed.

Sam slid Neville's trunk home and said, "Want me to get your suitcase?"

The girl, with bushy brown hair and eyes and light buck teeth, said, "Do you mind?"

"Not at all," Sam reassured her, reaching for it. "I'm Sam, by the way."

"Hermione Granger. You're not from around here, are you?"

"Nope. USA. 'Across the pond', I think you call it? Or is that just on TV?" He flashed a smile at her and slid the trunk home next to Neville's.

"Just on TV, I think," she said. "Hello."

"Hi," Neville said. "Neville Longbottom."

"Pleased to meet you," she said politely, sitting down across from him. "Are you holding a toad?"

Neville nodded eagerly. "His name's Trevor."

"Lovely," she said. "Sam, did you bring a pet?"

Sam shook his head. "You?"

"No. So how did your parents take the news?" she asked eagerly.

"Gran was overjoyed," Neville said. "They all thought I was a Squib, for a while."

"What's a Squib?" Hermione asked.

"Non-magic person born to magic parents," Neville explained. "I take it you're Muggle-born, from the question?"

"Muggle?" she asked.

"Non-magic people," Neville explained.

"Oh. Yes. My parents were absolutely _thrilled_ when I got my letter. Sam, how'd yours take it?"

Sam swallowed. "My dad...wasn't happy. He's very - religious. He kicked me out." He knew better than to tell them he was a hunter after the sheer number of warnings he'd received over the summer. "So what do your parents do, Hermione?"

"They're dentists," she said.

"Neville? What about your Gran?"

"She - uh - she lives off a pension," Neville said. "What House do you think you'll be in?" he repeated.

"Houses?" Sam asked again.

"Yeah. Four Houses at Hogwarts. Gryffindor for the brave, Hufflepuff for the loyal, Ravenclaw for the smart, Slytherin for the - cunning, I think, is what it's supposed to be, but mostly it just creates Dark wizards."

Dark wizards sounded like something from a kids' book, but then, so did his companions' names.

"Ambition, really, is what makes Slytherins," Hermione said. "I've read _Hogwarts, A History_ , and it talks about the House system."

"Can I borrow that book sometime?" Sam asked.

"Of course," Hermione said. "It's in my trunk, but I can get it for you."

"Thanks," Sam said appreciatively.

"I hope I'll be in Gryffindor," Neville said. "It was my parents' House."

"I hope for Gryffindor, too," Hermione said brightly. "Though I don't think Ravenclaw would be too bad. Sam? What about you?"

"I don't know," he hedged. "I really don't know anything about it. How do we get sent into Houses, do you know?"

"A singing hat," Neville said promptly.

Sam instantly dismissed that as too ridiculous to be true, but didn't ask again. Hermione got her trunk down and found the book for Sam, and he settled in to read.

He was only on chapter two when the train jarred, the door opened, and Neville blurted, "Trevor!" The toad had taken the opportunity to leap from Neville's hand and make a bid for freedom. Sam jumped to his feet and caught the thing before it got far, returning the amphibian to his - friend? Comrade? Neville thanked him profusely; Sam waved off the thanks, used his wand to hover Hermione's trunk back to storage (why that hadn't occurred to him earlier he honestly didn't know), and settled back down to read.

"It's getting late," Hermione said when the car's lights turned on. "We should probably change."

"Yeah, sure," Sam said. "Is there a bathroom somewhere?"

"We'll just turn our backs on each other," Hermione said with a shrug.

They did as she suggested, changing in unison. Sam showed Neville and Hermione how to tie their ties - gray for now, though Sam had seen older students with colored ones roaming the halls in the colors Neville had told him indicated House and remembered seeing the colored ties in the store. Neville had plopped Trevor into a container with a lid for the duration. He didn't offer an explanation for his failure to do that earlier, and neither Sam nor Hermione asked for one.

The castle came into sight shortly thereafter. Sam offered Hermione her book back, got down their trunks, and took a deep breath.

A voice echoed through the train: "We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minutes' time. Please leave your luggage on the train. It will be taken to the school separately."

Neville and Hermione smiled nervously. Sam straightened all their ties before they opened the door and moved into the hallway, joining the throngs of people eagerly surging forward. Older students were in there, too; clearly this school treated its students well. Nobody could wait to return.

They were caught up in the throng and pulled outside onto a tiny platform. A booming voice belonging to the man Sam easily recognized as a Leaky Cauldron regular who had escorted Lightning-Scar Kid yelled, "Firs' years! Firs' years over here! All right there, Harry? C'mon, follow me - any more firs' years? Mind yer step now! Firs' years follow me!"

Sam, Neville, and Hermione elbowed their way through the crowd - well, Sam elbowed, Neville and Hermione nudged - and ended up standing near the middle of the crowd. Up close, the regular was even larger than he'd appeared from a distance. He was very clearly not full-human.

But then, were any witches or wizards full-human?

He turned and walked away, clearly expecting the mass of people in dark cloaks followed him. Sam worked his way to the back of the group and scanned his surroundings. To both sides of the steep, well-worn path were woods. Sam could see shadows moving in the depths of the trees and gripped the knife he'd managed to hide in his pocket without Neville or Hermione seeing. If something attacked, he was ready.

"Yeh'll get yer firs' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec, jus' round this bend here," their guide called. A few people at the front of the throng started making appreciative noises, followed by the rest as more people turned the corner.

Sam himself came to a complete halt, feeling oddly helpless. The building sat intimidatingly on top of a sheer cliff face. Light shone coldly from the windows. Sam broke out in a cold sweat, goosebumps rippling up and down his arms. He fought the urge to run and hide; he emphatically did _not_ want to continue on.

He forced his numb feet forward, barely hearing the guide's voice telling them to get into boats. He didn't know who he sat with, except they weren't Neville or Hermione. The boats lurched forward. Sam closed his eyes against the sick feeling in his chest. Diving into the lake and drowning, he was suddenly sure, would be better than facing the castle and whatever awaited him there.

He dug his fingernails into the meaty parts of his hands. No. He was here for a _reason,_ and he'd be damned if some magic fear-spell prevented him from following through. He focused on his breathing instead, which had picked up unsteadily. Hyperventilation, his mind helpfully supplied. He was cold, clammy, and hyperventilating. He was going into shock.

 _No,_ he told himself, inhaling to a count of seven and exhaling to eleven. It would be okay. He would make this work.

He really didn't have a choice. He would make it work or- well, he didn't actually know. What did the Ministry do with foreign Muggle-born students? He didn't know. He didn't want to find out.

Ivy slapped his face and the sky closed above him, sharpening his panic. He _hated_ enclosed spaces, so much so he barely realized when the boat ground to a halt and the other three clambered out.

"You alrigh' there?" the man asked, bending down to peer at him.

Sam snapped out of the stupor. "I. Uh. Yeah. I'm fine." He got out of the boat on shaky legs, still regulating his breathing.

"You there. This your toad?" the man asked the next boat.

"Trevor!" Neville cried. Sam turned to see him gratefully taking the toad from the man. Lightning-Scar Kid, Hermione, and a redhead boy were standing there like they'd shared the boat.

The man led the way up a steep passage. Sam stayed at the back, sweating heavily in baseless fear. What was _wrong_ with him? He'd _never_ had a reaction like this before.

Sam hadn't even realize they'd stopped moving before Hagrid raised his hand and knocked three times on a heavy oak door.


	4. The Sorting Hat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Much of the dialogue is taken verbatim from HPSS.

The door opened instantly, revealing a tall, thin woman in a green dress with her brown hair pulled back in a severe bun, her expression one of faint disapproval.

"The firs' years, Professor McGonagall," the man said.

"Thank you, Hagrid," she said in a trilling Scottish accent. "I will take them from here."

So the giant man was named Hagrid. Good to know. But was that his first or last name? At least with 'Professor' he knew McGonagall was her last. If he ever ran into the giant again, was he supposed to call him 'Hagrid' or 'Mr. Hagrid' or 'Professor Hagrid'? 

He forced himself forward again, following his new classmates through the doorway. The foyer was gigantic, easily the size of any ten apartments and motel rooms Sam had ever lived in, and lit by torches on the walls. There was a marble staircase in front of them; glancing up to see where it led, Sam couldn't even make out the ceiling.

 _Guess staying in shape won't be a problem here,_ he thought with forced humor. He lagged behind the others, examining the room in an effort to distract himself. He was the last one inside the small room the others had gathered in, and he shut the door behind himself.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," McGonagall began. "The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you're here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts."

Sam winced at the thought. Would the other students enforce discipline? What were the rules? What were the _punishments?_

"You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory, and spend free time in your house common room."

 _But there's an entire castle,_ Sam thought, though exploring didn't seem like a good idea at the moment. He took a juddering breath and tried to pay attention.

"The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn you house points, while any rule-breaking will lose house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the house cup, a great honor. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours."

It was a far cry from the way Neville had described the House system. And 'triumphs'? Would they have to compete in a tournament or something? Maybe their grades were determined by who did best.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I suggest you all smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting. I shall return when we are ready for you. Please wait quietly." She moved toward the door; students hastened to make room for her.

When she reached Sam, she said quietly, "Winchester?"

"Yes, ma'am," Sam said, swallowing nervously.

She examined him critically and said, "Hunter's child? Or a hunter?"

"Both."

She nodded. "Come with me."

He followed her out the door and halted when she did. "There are spells on the castle to swamp any hunter who approaches with fear," she told him. "We thought you might be affected, but we weren't sure. I would guess you are?"

"I - yes, ma'am," Sam admitted.

She nodded once and said, "There's a counter-spell. Don't panic." She pulled her wand and pointed it at his forehead. Sam tensed, breathing growing ragged as his tenuous control dissolved. He did _not_ like being on the receiving end of a weapon. McGonagall murmured something he couldn't hear over the pounding of his heart and there was a flash of blue light.

Sam staggered back, suddenly gasping. The fear was gone. He leaned over, hands on his knees, to try to catch his breath. "Was that-"

"Yes," she said simply. "Return to the room and wait."

"Yes, ma'am," Sam managed. "Thank you."

"You're welcome." She began to turn away, then paused. "There are several ghosts and a poltergeist here, Winchester. Do not hunt or attack them." She swept through a set of doors through which Sam could hear people talking and laughing - probably the 'Great Hall' she had mentioned. Sam returned to the small room just as the ghosts he'd been warned about swarmed them.

Sam grabbed convulsively at the knife, reminding himself it was there before he remembered McGonagall's edict. There were twenty of them, more than he'd ever seen in one place. They were - talking? And _getting along?_ They weren't actually _swarming_ the new students, per se, more gliding along ten feet above their heads. Most of them didn't actually seem to have noticed them yet.

That lasted until a ghost wearing the costume of 15th-century courtiers looked down in the middle of talking, breaking off what he was saying about someone named 'Peeves' to demand, "I say, what are you all doing here?"

Nobody answered. The lingering effects of the fear spell were still on Sam, or he might have answered. On further reflection, he changed that thought: he wasn't going to talk to ghosts, whether they were vengeful or peaceful. It was a bad idea to speak to the dead.

"New students!" exclaimed the ghost of a fat monk. "About to be Sorted, I suppose?"

"Yes," a few people said.

"Hope to see you in Hufflepuff!" the monk said. "My old house, you know."

The door opened behind Sam and McGonagall's sharp voice said, "Move along now. The Sorting Ceremony's about to start. Now form a line and follow me."

The ghosts phased through the wall on the far side of the room. The new students followed McGonagall to the Great Hall.

At least two football stadiums could easily fit inside the room. Candles floated above the tables that spanned most of the room's length and were set with golden plates, silverware, and wineglasses. At the front, a raised section of floor held another long table where adults sat - the teachers' table, Sam guessed. In the middle was an old man in a blue dress; at one end sat Hagrid. Sam recognized nobody else, though the man in the purple turban looked vaguely familiar. Sam had probably seen him at the Leaky Cauldron at some point.

McGonagall signaled them to a halt, but continued forward herself. Sam took the opportunity to look around more. Hundreds of students surrounded them, interspersed with the ghosts Sam had already seen. Looking up, he found there was no ceiling - or maybe there was, but it was spelled to look like the sky. That could be useful, if there was no weather forecast service for the students.

A new voice at the front of the room began to _sing._ Attention caught by the oddity, Sam looked back down.

It was a hat. A torn hat was singing to them. From the looks of the older students, this was expected, maybe even _anticipated_.

 _What_ had he gotten himself into?

He mentally shook himself and made himself listen to the words, though he'd missed most of the song:

_Those cunning folk use any mean  
To achieve their ends.  
So put me on  
Don't be afraid  
And don't get in a flap!  
You're in safe hands, though I have none,  
For I'm a thinking cap!_

The older students and teachers clapped as did a few first-years. The hat bowed to all four tables and then settled down. Sam heard whispers behind him and tried to ignore them. Whatever happened next, he would deal with as it came.

McGonagall came forward to stand next to the hat. There was a roll of paper in her hand. "When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted. Abbott, Hannah!"

A girl with blonde pigtails and rosy-red cheeks stumbled forward. She was shaking as she picked up the hat, sat down in its place, and dropped it down on her head. It came over her eyes. There was a moment of silence, everyone's eyes glued to the girl and the oversized hat, and then the ripped fabric parted again and the hat yelled, "HUFFLEPUFF!"

A table filled with people wearing yellow ties exploded into cheers and applause. So yellow was for Hufflepuffs, who were - what had Neville said, loyal? He'd left his family to protect himself; Hufflepuff was definitely not going to welcome him.

"Bones, Susan!" McGonagall called.

Another blonde girl walked forward, though she was more confident than Hannah had been. She sat on the stool, put on the hat. She, too, went into Hufflepuff.

Terry Boot and Mandy Brocklehurst went to Ravenclaw, who had blue ties. Lavender Brown went to Gryffindor and the ones with red ties. Millicent Bulstrode, Vincent Crabbe, and Gregory Goyle all went to Slytherin, who had green. Justin Finch-Fletchley went to Hufflepuff, too. Seamus Finnigan, Hermione, and Neville all went to Gryffindor, and Sam tuned out. He knew where the two people he'd spoken to were going.

He idly wondered if he could learn how to enchant a ceiling like the Great Hall's. There was probably some kind of weather protectant, right? There had to be. So a water-repellant, an insulator, and an invisibility spell. Did those even exist? Or maybe there was no ceiling at all, and it was just a repel-everything-that-comes-close spell. Maybe the reason the Hall wasn't muggy from the heat and damp outside was because it was so high. Was it high enough to condense and rain inside?

A sudden influx of whispers brought Sam's attention back to the present. Lightning-Scar-Kid was moving forward to the hat, and people were whispered, "Potter? Did she say _Potter?_ Harry Potter's here?"

Now Sam was interested. Who was this kid and why was he so important? The entire bar of the Leaky Cauldron had nearly shut down during lunch hour for him, and now the students were all trying to get a good look at him. Even the teachers were showing more than polite interest.

People began shifting impatiently around the thirty-second mark; fifteen seconds later, the hat yelled, "Gryffindor!" 

The red table exploded. The cheers Hermione, Neville, and Seamus had gotten were _nothing_ compared to the reception Harry got. Dean Thomas, who was sorted immediately after and also became a Gryffindor, was overlooked in the cheer over Harry. Lisa Turpin became a Ravenclaw. Ron Weasley, the redhead who had been in the boat with Harry, Hermione, and Neville, became a Gryffindor. Only two of them were left. Hermione and Neville gave Sam excited thumbs-up as he walked to the stool.

The hat dropped over his head, covering his eyes, and a small voice in his ear said, "Hmm. Intelligent and cunning and brave, aren't you?"

Sam nearly jumped out of his skin; the only thing that stopped him was the knowledge that this was what everyone else had apparently gone through. He curled his hands into fists around the stool's seat and didn't respond.

"A real need to prove yourself, isn't there? You don't care what it takes, you'll follow through to the end. There's really only one place for you - SLYTHERIN!"

Sam took the hat off, offered it to McGonagall (who looked at him with vague surprise but took the hat anyway), and walked to the cheering table, finding a spot near the end closest to the teachers with the other new students. Blaise Zabini joined them a few moments later.

The man in the blue dress stood and spread his arms. "Welcome!" he called. "Welcome to another year at Hogwarts! Before we begin, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Oddment! Blubber! Tweak! Thank you!"

He sat. The students clapped and cheered; Sam joined in on the applause awkwardly. The blond kid across from him just sneered.

The table abruptly filled with food, and Sam sucked in a breath. More food than he'd seen in his _life_ was suddenly piled in front of him: meats, potatoes, vegetables, pasta, gravy, glass jugs filled with either an orange liquid he couldn’t even guess at or a clear liquid he assumed was water.

He tried the orange drink first and frowned. What did it remind him of? There was something...pie. Pumpkin pie without the spices. It was pumpkin juice, and it was surprisingly good. He filled his glass and served himself a piece of chicken, a serving of broccoli, and some cubed potatoes with some kind of herb. There was something hard that was striped in red and gold he didn't try, and more unfamiliar food than he could even guess at.

The blond boy across from his was talking arrogantly about how the food was better at his house. He abruptly stopped when a ghost in a stained waistcoat sat next to him. He had the hollow-cheeked look of someone slowly starving to death; maybe that _was_ how he'd died, though the discolorations Sam had the sinking suspicion were blood told a far different tale.

"Hello," he said.

"Hi," the first-years, with the exception of Blondie, chorused.

"I am the Bloody Baron. I am your house ghost."

They exchanged glances, not quite sure what to say to that. Thankfully, he departed soon after, and they resumed eating.

"I'm Draco Malfoy," the blond announced importantly. "These are Crabbe and Goyle."

"Blaise Zabini," the thin black boy who had been last to be sorted said.

"Pansy Parkinson," piped in a girl with dark hair and a pug nose.

"Millicent Bulstrode," a solid girl with dark hair said.

"Sam Winchester," Sam said. "Do any of you know who the guy in the blue dress is?"

"You're not from around here," Pansy said.

"No, I'm not. Who is he?"

"Albus Dumbledore." Draco sneered. "My father says he's the worst thing to ever happen to this school."

"Why?"

"He's a Muggle-lover," Draco spat.

Sam waited for him to go on, and when he didn't, he prompted, "Which means?"

"He works to protect Muggles from wizards," Blaise explained.

Sam blinked, confused. "And that's a bad thing?"

"Yes!" Draco snapped. "They're not like us, why should they be protected?"

Sam was taken aback for a moment. "So what you're saying is that _you_ are a racist asshole?"

Draco turned bright red and said, "Just wait until my father hears about this."

Sam shrugged and turned back to his food. "What's he gonna do, torture me?" he asked sarcastically. "Get me expelled? Kill me?"

"He'll- he'll-" Draco spluttered.

The table around them collapsed into giggles. Millicent grinned at him.

Talk turned to other things. Sam mentioned he'd spent the summer at the Leaky Cauldron. Millicent told them about her mother. Her father had died in the war, she'd explained. They'd both stayed out of it, but their apartment collapsed one day. She accepted their sympathies and continued telling them about her mother. Blaise countered with stories about his parents and little brother, whose antics had them all laughing, even Draco. Even Sam, who couldn't help thinking about Dean and his father. Something in his chest ached sharply.

Somewhere along the line, the real food vanished to be replaced with dessert. Ice cream, cake, pies, cream puffs, éclairs and donuts (which Sam had only ever had for breakfast), fruit, puddings, more things Sam couldn't name. He carefully prodded a bowl of sticky white… _something_ and asked, "What is this?"

"Rice pudding," Pansy told him.

"This pie is fantastic," Blaise said through a mouthful of blueberry.

Sam took a slice himself, reminded uncomfortably of Dean. He swallowed his first bite and said, "Blaise, if we're ever in Mississippi, remind me to take you to this one diner. Twelve kinds of pie, all of them fantastic. They've even got this beat."

"Really?" Blaise asked, eyes wide.

"Yeah. My brother and I-" Sam stopped and swallowed the lump in his throat. "We went there almost every day when I was nine. Pie for every meal."

"What did your parents say?" Pansy asked, eyes wide.

"Dad was out of town. He didn't say anything because he didn't know."

"What about your mom?" Blaise asked.

"Died when I was a baby," Sam answered before immediately changing the subject. "Mississippi has the best blueberry pies in the country. But if you want good barbecue, you gotta be south of the Mason-Dixon Line-"

"Which is?" Draco interrupted.

"Oh, sorry. It's the line that marked the war boundary in the Civil War," he explained. "Or something like that. I'm not really sure, actually. Never had a good history class - I moved too often."

"How often?" Pansy asked.

"Every two weeks. Sometimes we stayed somewhere longer, sometimes we only stayed a day or so. But enough about that. Like I was saying, good barbecue means stay in the south, but good subs come from the north. Mexican is in the Southwest, Japanese is in California. Wisconsin's got the best grilled cheese you've ever tasted. Virginia has the best apple pies, little place just off Route 66 called the Apple House makes Alpenglow, best drink I've ever had. Their pies are mediocre, though. Uh, that's about - no, wait, best cornbread comes from Kansas."

"What are these places?" Draco demanded.

"Oh, uh, states. Like, um, I'm not really sure what the British equivalent is, actually. Surrey, maybe? Things around that size?" He was guessing; geography hadn't been his strong suit in school, and he'd never even considered British geography before. "Towns are the smallest, then counties, then states. Then the country."

They seemed to accept his explanation, though none offered the British version.

Eventually, the desserts disappeared, though the jugs of juice stayed behind, Dumbledore stood for "start-of-term notices". Sam got the feeling 'term' here meant 'semester'. He'd ask later. For now, he listened to the warning about staying out of the forest, not using magic in the hallways, that there would be "Quidditch tryouts" the second week of term - Sam made another mental note to ask what 'Quidditch' was - and that one of the hallways was out-of-bounds under pain of death.

Sam laughed, but very few others did. Most looked somber. Had that hallway killed someone before? Oh, crap, had he just laughed at somebody's life ending?

"And now, let's sing the school song!" Dumbledore said brightly. He flicked his wand, and words twisted out of his wand to hover in shiny gold above his head. "Everyone pick their favorite tune, and off we go!"

Sam glanced around. Dumbledore wasn't _serious,_ was he? There was no way that poem was the school song, and there was even less of a chance there wasn't a set tune for it.

But no. People were singing, even Draco. Sam didn't join in, not even sure where to start. The only tune he could think of was 'Walk This Way', which made him think of his brother and how he'd left his family to come here.

When the last singers - identical redheaded boys singing to a tune that sounded more appropriate for a mainstream funeral than a school song - had fallen quiet, Dumbledore wiped fake tears from his eyes and said, "Ah, music, a magic beyond all we do here. And now, bedtime. Off you trot."

Older Slytherins appeared so quickly Sam half-thought they'd teleported. Was there a way to do _that?_ The new students followed them through the foyer, down the marble stairs, through a wooden door, down a long hallway, and then down a staircase to a section of wall that looked almost exactly like every other section. "Parseltongue," one of the older students said, and the wall opened.

The room it opened into was very large. A snake coiled on a shield above the fireplace. The lit fire gave off warmth and light; like every other place Sam had been in, the room was lit by candles and torches. The couches and chairs were dark green and silver, the carpet and walls both green. There were cabinets around the room made of dark-stained wood and windows on either side of the fireplace looking out onto the lake.

 _Someone really liked green,_ Sam thought absently. He knew green was their house color, but this seemed excessive.

The older students led them to the couches in front of the fire and said, "Sit." They obeyed, though Sam balked at following orders like a trained dog.

Or like John Winchester's son.

The older students introduced themselves as Leo and Aria. They were prefects, which was why they had badges with 'P' on their chest. They gave the younger students a quick rundown of the house system, points system, and teachers, including that the Potions Master, Snape, was their Head of House and tasked with discipline.

At the end of the impromptu meeting, they handed each of them a stack of paper. "Maps," Aria explained. "Each page is a floor. Classrooms, common rooms, the library, and the Great Hall are marked."

"Boys' dorms are to the left, girls' to the right," Leo told them. "Get to bed. Breakfast is from eight to nine, so be up early enough to do whatever your normal morning routine is. Now go."

"Are there alarm clocks or anything?" Sam asked.

"There's a spell," Leo said. "We'll come knock on your doors around seven. You need to be up before then?"

"I usually run in the morning," Sam explained.

"How long?"

"Hour or so."

"I'll show you the spell before you go to sleep," Leo said. "Or I'll set it for you."

"Thanks."

"The rest of you, get to bed," Aria said. "There's a sign on the door. First-years."

They scattered, and Leo looked at Sam. "Got something you'll keep next to your bed?"

"Um. A picture?" Sam guessed. "If there's a table nearby."

"You have your own nightstand. Go get your picture."

Sam found his way to the dorm. There were six wardrobes, six nightstands, and six beds. Five of them had already been claimed by Draco, Crabbe, Goyle, Blaise, and a weedy boy whose name Sam hadn't caught. Sam's duffel sat in the middle of the floor. He pulled it up to the unclaimed bed and rifled through it to find the photo in its frame.

"Family?" Leo asked when he came back.

"Yeah," Sam said softly. "It won't - it won't damage anything, will it?"

"No," Leo reassured him. "Not if you get it right."

"Can I practice on something else first, then?"

"Yeah, sure. Here." Leo tossed him a ball sitting on one of the tables. "We'll practice on this."

Sam blew it apart, set it on fire, set it bouncing across the room, and flattened it into a circle before he finally got it right. Each time, Leo set it right and waited patiently for him to try again. He practiced on six other objects before he dared put it the spell his picture frame.


	5. The Potions Master

The alarm spell worked perfectly, waking Sam at five-thirty. He changed into jeans and a T-shirt, strapped on his watch, grabbed the map he'd been given, and found his way outside. He did a few stretches and then he was off. He wasn't quite sure how long it would take him to run all the way around the castle, but he was sure he'd find out.

It took him just over an hour of jogging interspersed with sprints, and he went back inside with sore muscles and the knowledge that he'd slacked off over the summer. He needed to get himself back into shape.

He slipped into the empty common room ten minutes before seven. He crept into the dormitory, grabbed his clothes headed for the showers, grateful there were stalls and not a communal set-up. He had just finished getting dressed when he heard the other boys coming in to shower themselves. He escaped back to the dorm to finish putting on his shoes, socks, tie, and what looked very much like a thin bathrobe but which he had been assured was standard dress. He noticed the tie and robe had both been changed, the tie to a green-and-silver stripe pattern and the robe to have green silk trim and a patch with the house logo on it. He wasn't entirely comfortable with the knowledge that someone had been through his bags, but checking surreptitiously, he determined the knives in the bottom were all there, as were the Taurus, shotgun, and ammo.

"How do we know what books we'll need?" he asked Draco when he came out.

"We'll get our schedules at breakfast," he answered. "Just put parchment and some quills and ink in your bag, it should be okay."

"Cool, thanks," Sam said. Draco seemed to be too tired to put much effort into aristocracy, or maybe it was sinking in that he wasn't with his family anymore, Sam couldn't tell. He was just happy for the change.

"Cool?" he repeated, baffled.

"Yeah, like, uh, neat? Awesome? Good? Sorry."

"American English is ridiculous," he said.

Sam pulled on his overcoat. "These uniforms are ridiculous," he countered. "We're wearing bathrobes to class."

"It's traditional," Blaise said, emerging from the bathroom.

There was a knock on the door; Sam's watch said it was a quarter past seven. "Everyone awake?" someone called.

"Yes," they all called back.

"We leave around 7:45. You have a meeting with Snape before breakfast." Leo said nothing else, and Sam assumed he had continued on. He pulled on his tie and followed.

"Alarm spell work?" Leo asked when he made it to the common room.

"Yeah, thanks," Sam said gratefully.

When all eight of them were assembled, Leo and Aria led them to a door just up the stairs from the common room. Aria knocked; the door was opened by a man dressed in all black, which matched his oily hair. Dark eyes were set in a sallow face graced by a hooked nose. "First-years, Professor Snape," Aria said.

"Thank you, Miss Arachna," Snape said stiffly. "Go ahead to breakfast."

She and Leo walked away, leaving them alone with their head of house. "Inside," he ordered, eyes sweeping over them. They filed inside; Snape closed the door behind them and walked to survey them across the desk. While they waited for him to speak, Sam took the time to catalogue the contents. A plain wooden desk splotched with old stains, the varnish long since worn off - he taught Potions, which was almost like chemistry, which meant the stains were probably from chemicals. There were bookshelves all over the walls, some with tomes thicker than Sam's head, some with bottles lined up neatly, others with boxes labeled in sharp, spiky handwriting. There was a fireplace to his right, a Slytherin wall hanging to his left, and no visible exit except the one they'd just used. Sam considered the possibility there was a hidden door behind the hanging or one of the bookshelves and dismissed the idea.

"You have been chosen to join the Noble House of Slytherin," Snape said at last. "Our house is much maligned, and as such, your behavior must be impeccable. Students from other houses will take any excuse to dislike you for the color of your robes. Other teachers may turn a blind eye to your suffering, or give subpar help with their subjects." Sam got the distinct impression Snape didn't like being here, not his colleagues or his students. "If you feel a member of staff is being unfair, it is _imperative_ you inform me immediately. I cannot help if I do not know there's a problem.

"That said" - he reached into his desk and pulled out a stack of paper - "do not come running to me for everything. I do not care about your nightmares or homesickness. That is what your prefects are for. If you break a rule, you will have to serve detention with whomever you were assigned to. If you come to me for a rule that you broke, you will serve detention with the assigned teacher and with me. 

"These are your class schedules. For your first two years here, you will have seven classes: Defense Against the Dark Arts, currently taught by Professor Quirrell; Transfiguration with Professor McGonagall; Charms with Professor Flitwick; Herbology with Professor Sprout; History of Magic with Professor Binns, who is a ghost; Astronomy with Professor Sinistra; and Potions with me. This term you will also have flying lessons with Madam Hooch, who is the Quidditch referee."

So many things Sam didn't understand. There was 'Quidditch' again, and a teacher here was a ghost? Flying lessons? Did they actually fly on brooms here, or was it flying carpets, or was it levitation? Did they use dragons?

"In your third year, you will be allowed to choose electives," Snape continued. "We'll discuss those options more on your first day of third year."

He handed the sheaf of papers to Draco, who took a sheet and passed it on, before continuing. "There are four periods a day, with a break in between them. On Monday and Wednesday, you will have Defense first, followed by either Charms or Transfiguration. Whichever class you don't have in the morning you will have as a double period in the afternoon. Tuesday and Thursday mornings you will have double Herbology, followed by History of Magic, which is a double period Tuesday. On Thursday your fourth class will be flying. On Friday you have double Potions with me in the morning, followed by a free afternoon."

He looked over them all, a faint sneer on his lips. "Do not embarrass this house. Behave, study. Anyone underperforming in any class will have a meeting with me to discuss your lack of effort. Winchester, I want a word with you. The rest of you are dismissed."

Sam stepped to the side to let the others through the doorway, folding his schedule and sliding it into his pocket. Millicent, the last one to leave, gave him a pitying look just before she closed the door.

"Sit," Snape ordered, pointing at one of two chairs in front of the desk. Sam obeyed. Snape sat in the chair behind the desk and steepled his fingers. "Sam Winchester," he said. "You are American, Muggle-born, and hunter-raised, correct?"

"Yes, sir."

"You stayed at the Leaky Cauldron over the summer?"

"Yes, sir."

"The American schools decided your father was too large a threat to take you themselves."

"Yes, sir."

"I've read up on your family. Good hunters." He leaned forward. "When did you begin to join them?"

"Three years ago."

"That's when you began training?"

"No, sir," Sam said. "That's when I went on my first hunt. I began training a year earlier."

"I thought you hunters started later than that," Snape said.

"It really depends on who's calling the shots, sir."

"I see. So some of your family's reputation is actually your reputation. I take it you haven't told anyone?"

"No, sir."

"Why not?"

Sam swallowed, wondering just how dumb the man thought he was. "I'm really not stupid enough to advertise my family's job in a castle full of people practicing witchcraft. Sir." Snape was making him nervous. Where was he going with this?

"I believe McGonagall warned you about hunting on school grounds already."

When he looked meaningfully at Sam, he realized the man wanted an answer. "Um, she told me not to get rid of the ghosts. I'm not sure what else there is _on_ the grounds, sir."

"A poltergeist, for one." He leaned back in his seat. "Do not attack anything. Defending yourself is permissible, but it would be unwise for any students to see your level of skill. Should anyone ask, you are to pass it off as something you learn in your homeland as a matter of course. The headmaster has instructed the professors to back any such lie you tell. You will not get away with lying in any other circumstance, is that clear?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good. Get to breakfast."

"Yes, sir."

Breakfast was just as food-laden as dinner had been. Hash browns, sausage, bacon, pancakes, toast, fruit, and waffles were heaped on platters. He'd been on survival rations all summer, eating once a day and sometimes less. This was paradise to him. He filled his plate with hash browns, a waffle, and an apple and began to eat.

He couldn't actually finish everything he'd taken, which didn't particularly surprise him. He slipped the apple in his bag and drank his tea until it was time for Defense Against the Dark Arts with the Ravenclaws.

The class was a letdown. Sam had been expecting a lecture about combating black magic, or dangerous creatures, or spells that could help him defend himself against other wizards. Instead, Quirrell stuttered through his qualifications, told them the room smelled like garlic because he was afraid of revenge from a vampire he killed, and claimed the turban was given to him by an African prince because he'd killed a zombie. Sam had several reasons to doubt that story, not least of which the fact that he'd said 'African' instead of 'Egyptian' or 'Zimbabwean' or 'Rwandan'. 

It took Quirrell half an hour to get that far, and then he began going through an explanation of what vampires were, where they were found, and how to identify them. Sam very quickly zoned out - Quirrell was reading verbatim from the textbook he'd read three times over the summer. Blaise had to poke him with a quill to tell him class was over an hour later. They found their way to the Transfiguration classroom and stood outside for the fifteen-minute break. Sam ate his apple and listened to his classmates talk and laugh amongst themselves.

McGonagall began her class with a warning to both the Slytherins and the Hufflepuffs: "Transfiguration is some of the most complex and dangerous magic you will learn at Hogwarts. Anyone messing around in my class will leave and not come back. You have been warned."

She turned to her desk and said, " _Mutari elitporcus_." The wood turned into a large potbelly with a small 'pop'. Sam, who had been thoroughly drilled in three dead languages, did a double-take for two reasons: one, that was some of the most butchered Latin he'd ever heard spoken, and he'd practiced with _Dean;_ and two, that was an incredibly ridiculous use of magic. Why would he ever want to turn a pig into a desk?

McGonagall turned the pig back into her desk and began writing on the board. "Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration," she began. "To understand this, you will need a working knowledge of these alphabets." She began writing, and they hastened to copy. By the time they got out, most of them had cramps in their writing hands.

They had an hour for lunch. Sam sat at the end of the table, eating a salad he'd put together made of spinach, feta, tomatoes, and bell peppers while he listened to the other first-years talk about classes. Not one of them could explain when the desk-to-pig transformation would be useful.

Following lunch was double Charms with the Ravenclaws. They filed into the classroom and sat much as they had that morning, in clusters according to House. 

Flitwick was so short he had to stand on a stack of books to see over his desk. He began with roll call; when he reached Sam's name, he said, "The American?"

"Yes, sir," Sam said.

"Hmm. Blaise Zabini?"

"Here, sir."

"Then let's get started," he said excitedly, waving his wand. Writing appeared on the board. "Charms is a sort of catch-all class," he began. "If it's not a transfiguration or a curse, it's probably a charm." He spent the rest of the double period on an overview of what they could expect the next seven years: lock-picking charm, summoning, banishing, cheering, repairing, shields….

It was the last that caught Sam's attention. Though he took notes, he marked in the margin, _Ask about shields._ It could be useful.

He did just that, waiting after class for the rest of the class to leave before he tentatively walked forward and said, "Professor Flitwick?"

"Hmm?" He turned around from directing the erasers across the board. "Ah, yes, Winchester. What can I help you with?"

"I wanted to ask you about the shield charm," he said.

"You learn that fifth year," Flitwick said.

"Is there more than one type?"

Flitwick hopped onto the desk. "Why so curious?"

"I just want to be able to protect myself," he said.

Flitwick looked at him curiously and flicked his wand. Sam heard the door close. "You were raised a hunter."

It wasn't phrased as a question, but Sam said, "Yes, sir," anyway.

"You're unused to being unable to defend yourself, I'm guessing?" Flitwick continued. "Thrown into a magic world and unsure how to protect against anything that comes at you."

"Exactly," Sam said, feeling muscles loosen in relief at being understood.

Flitwick scribbled something on a piece of paper and handed it out to him. _An Overview of Shields, by Auxilius Prostasia - CH179,_ he read. "A book?"

"Yes," Flitwick said. "Read that whole thing and write me at least two feet of notes on the strengths and weaknesses of each shield, and I'll help you learn them." To his look of surprise, Flitwick said, "I won't waste time on someone who doesn't care about the work. Do this or wait until fifth year."

"Yes, sir," Sam said. "When do you want it?"

"No later than next Thursday," he said.

"Thank you."

"No problem. Now get to dinner."

"Yes, sir." Sam turned and slipped away, pulling the map from his pocket so he could find his way down.

"Sam!" someone called when he was a hallway away from the main staircase.

He turned to see Hermione. "Hey," he said, smiling at her. "How's it going?"

"It's going fine," she said. "How are your classes?"

"They're all right." He almost started to tell her about Flitwick's offer of help, but something made him hold back. "I've had Defense, Transfiguration, and Charms so far. What about you?"

"Herbology, History of Magic, and Defense."

"Quirrell's a little...off, isn't he?" Sam said delicately.

Hermione hid a smile behind a hand. "He's certainly something else. How did you find your way here?" she demanded when he turned onto the staircase.

"Our prefects gave us maps," he explained.

"Ours didn't!" She looked outraged.

"Yeah, but your house is about courage. It's probably because they want you to explore on your own," Sam teased.

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Possibly. I'll ask Percy."

"So you've had Herbology and History? What are those like?" Sam asked, changing the subject away from whomever Percy was.

"Herbology is like gardening. Professor Sprout's pretty nice. History of Magic was a little dull, but maybe it will get better soon. How was Charms?"

"Interesting," he said, "but only because I like theory. He said we'd start color-changing charms on Wednesday, though."

"Those are in the book, right?" she asked, biting her lip.

"Yeah. Chapter two, I think. Did McGonagall change her desk into a pig for your class?"

"Yes, why?"

"I was just wondering if she told you what the use of that was."

Hermione looked surprised. "No, she didn't. And I didn't think to ask."

They reached the doors to the Great Hall and he said, "I'm going to the library after dinner, if you want me to show you the way."

"Yes, please," she said eagerly.

"I'll meet you out here, then."

"See you then." She grinned at him, showing off her oversized front teeth. Sam went in through the smaller door closest to the Slytherin table; Hermione went through the one closer to Gryffindor's.

Sam stayed quiet through dinner, which again had more food than he could have imagined. He'd already eaten two meals; he really wasn't hungry. He probably would be by midnight, though, so he slid a pear and an orange into his bag. He was _loving_ the fruit they had here; before, the best he'd been able to get was mealy apples and bananas that were always over- or under-ripe. The fruit here was fantastic, crisp and juicy and probably organic. The skin was less waxy than other fruit he'd had, anyway. The salad he'd had for lunch had lacked the chemical taste of the vegetables he'd gotten in the greasy spoon diners his family frequented. The food here was _fantastic_ , and he wished he'd never have to leave.

Maybe he'd become a teacher.

When the main courses sparked out of existence to be replaced by dessert, Sam looked up and made eye contact with Hermione. She tilted her head toward the doors and he stood.

"Where are you going?" Pansy asked him.

"Library," Sam said. "Flitwick gave me a book to read."

"Ugh," Draco said.

Sam just smiled. "I'll be back by curfew."

He met Hermione in the foyer and Sam pulled out his map. He glanced through the pages until he found it. "Second floor," he said. "Off the staircase, two lefts and a right."

"Wish I had one of those," she said enviously.

"You wanna copy it?" he offered.

Her eyes lit up. "Yes, please!"

"You can do it in the library." As they started to walk, he said, "Okay, so do you even know how to use quills?"

"No," she said, showing him her hand. It was smudged with ink.

Sam grinned and showed her his own, which matched. "Think we should get someone to show us how, or should we just find pens somewhere?"

"Where?"

"I don't know. I can get some next summer, I guess, if I have the money."

"I can get a pack of a hundred over the break and split them with you," Hermione offered. 

"Thanks!"

"Not a problem."

Sam found both _Hogwarts, A History_ and the shield book Flitwick had mentioned. Not wanting to draw attention to the extra homework he was doing, he opened the history book instead while Hermione copied his map. They were the only two in the library, and the woman working at the desk eyed them suspiciously but made no comment.

At eight-thirty, almost two hours since they'd left dinner, Hermione sat down her quill with a sigh. "Done," she said triumphantly.

"Awesome." Sam took his map back and folded it into the pocket-sized square. "We're almost to curfew."

"We should go, then," Hermione said regretfully. "I don’t think we have a class together until Friday, though."

"Then I'll see you Friday," Sam said, standing and deftly hiding the smaller Charms book beneath the gigantic tome that was _Hogwarts, A History._ He checked them both out and left with Hermione. They parted at the staircases, she going up and he going down.

He began the extra-credit as soon as he was in the dormitory, kicking off his shoes and climbing into bed to take notes. He started munching on his pear around ten, but didn't eat his orange until he woke up the next morning to run. He read _Hogwarts_ during meals and on his breaks, and finished during lunch on Thursday.

Herbology and History of Magic, both double periods on Wednesday, were much as Hermione had said: gardening and boring. Sam nearly fell asleep in history, and looking around, he saw everyone was fighting the same battle. Some had lost. Sam pulled out the charms book and took notes. He'd read the history book three times; he knew about the goblin wars.

On Wednesday afternoon, McGonagall handed out matchsticks and told them to turn it into a needle. This was something Sam had practiced endlessly over the summer, pursuing it with a single-minded intensity and pinning down the feeling of it coursing through his veins. He'd learned it was less about the shape of it than the path it took through his body, whether it started in his toes or head or chest; charms was nearly the opposite, with the spells ballooning or expanding or forcing themselves through him. Sam focused on the match and murmured, _"Ligna metallo_ ". The match changed silently, so one moment he was looking at dull brown and the next at shiny silver.

"How did you do that?" Millicent whispered to him.

Sam turned to show her and correct her pronunciation. He wasn't sure he could explain the feeling of it, and the one time he tried, she gave him a weird look and said she didn't feel anything at all, even when her match caught fire.

"Mr. Winchester," McGonagall said when her attention was attracted by the flame. "Have you managed to transfigure your matchstick, or are you merely procrastinating?"

"No, I changed it," Sam said, picking it up from his desk and showing it to her.

"And now you're attempting to help Miss Bulstrode?"

"Yes, ma'am."

She eyed him skeptically. "That was a match before? Not a needle you brought in?"

Sam's temper flared, and he tamped it down. "Yes," he said shortly.

"Show me on Miss Bulstrode's match, then."

" _Ligna metallo,_ " he muttered, twitching his wand at Millicent's match. It changed instantly, becoming shiny and pointy.

"Two points to Slytherin for being the first," she said.

"Thanks," he said, taken aback by her sudden change of heart. Maybe she was surprised he'd done so well? He'd been raised to hate magic, after all, and she'd know that.

She smiled, turned to Millicent, and said, "Show me what you're doing." At the end of the period she told them to read and summarize the next chapter in their book. Terry Boot, Lisa Turpin, Draco, and Pansy had been the only students other than Sam to manage the spell by the end of the period, and they were the ones to escape without practice on top of the foot-long essay she assigned them.

The next day began with double Herbology again, and they trudged back up to the castle with the Ravenclaws smelling like dung. Sam elected to skip lunch in favor of showering and taking more notes on the charms book. He was halfway through, with notes on the five spells spanning over a foot already. He made a note to himself, on the piece of parchment he'd taken to writing questions and thoughts down on, to look up a measuring spell so he'd know how long his essay was.

The flying lesson was cancelled that day, for reasons unknown, so after Defense in the early afternoon Sam went to the library. "Excuse me," he said to the woman at the desk - the same one who had checked him out just days before. "Is there a way to find books by subject?"

She looked at him like he was an insect. "Call number."

"I'm sorry?"

"Call number," she repeated. "Ch for charms. Tr for Transfiguration. Po for Potions. Understand?"

"Yes, ma'am," Sam said, beating a hasty retreat. He pulled his scrap parchment from his pocket and started his search. There was nothing under 'Cu' for culture, 'So' for sociology, or 'Wi' for 'wizardry'. He struck gold under 'Qu', though - he found dozens of books for 'Quidditch'. He pulled out one of the thinner ones and flipped through.

Quidditch was a _sport!_ Played on broomsticks, which actually answered another of Sam's questions. They actually flew on actual brooms. Incredible.

He shelved the book and moved on to the next question on his paper. By the time dinner rolled around, he'd gotten all of them answered and had finished the paper on shielding charms. He would probably need to recopy it to fix the smudges, but that was doable. He just wished he knew why he felt the need to keep it secret.  
***  
Friday morning dawned warm and clear. Sam was halfway through his usual run around the castle when he heard a dog barking. He slowed to a stop and looked around. There was an enormous brown dog with a wrinkly face running toward him, mouth open and tongue hanging out. It wasn't even _close_ to an aggressive posture, so Sam didn't run, instead waiting until it got close and offering it his hand to sniff.

"Hey, uh, boy," he said, checking its sex when the dog shoved its head into his hand so Sam would pet it. "Where'd you come from, huh?"

The dog _whuffed_ and sat, staring at him and panting happily as he scratched his ear. He wasn't wearing a collar.

"Did you come out of the forest?" Sam guessed, kneeling to scratch his head with both hands. "Or a neighbor's house?"

"Fang!" someone bellowed. Sam looked away from the dog to see Hagrid jogging toward them. "Hullo," he said when he was closer.

"Hi," Sam said, rubbing his hand against his pants and standing. Fang whined and nosed at him, looking for more attention, and Sam gave in with a smile.

"Sorry 'bout Fang," Hagrid said.

"It's fine," Sam reassured him. "I like dogs."

"He usually don't run off like that," Hagrid continued. "Don' know what it was tha' sen' him off. What are yeh doin' out here so early?"

"Running," Sam said.

"Fer yer health?"

"Yeah," Sam hedged.

"Alrigh'. Well, we'll leave yeh be. C'mon, Fang. See yeh 'round."

"Bye," Sam said. Hagrid and Fang left, and Sam resumed his run. At breakfast, he, Pansy, and Blaise discussed the Transfiguration essay they had due before going back down to the dungeons for Potions. Sam found a seat at the table in the back with Blaise, the weedy boy whose name he still didn't know, and Millicent. Pansy, Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle sat at the table next to them. The Gryffindors filed in five minutes before class began; Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Lavender Brown, and Hermione Granger sat at one table, two people whose names Sam didn't know at the other with Neville and Seamus Finnegan.

The room was set up much as Sam's elementary school classrooms had been, with tables that sat four neatly arranged - in this case, in a square. There were eight Slytherins, which meant there were eight Gryffindors, as well - unless the seating was wrong. That had happened before, too many people assigned to a classroom. The major difference, other than the walls that were grey stone instead of white faux-cinderblock, was the jars lined up along the walls with various animals inside them.

Snape breezed in with a minute to go before class began. He began with roll call, which was how Sam learned the names of the three Gryffindors he hadn't recognized and that his housemate's name was Theodore Nott.

When he reached Harry's name, Snape's lips curled in a sneer. "Ah, yes. Harry Potter. Our new... _celebrity._ "

He finished roll without further incident, and once he was done, he began a rambling speech about how much potions could do. The rest of the class was enthralled, Sam noted from quick glances around, but it seemed like a mean-spirited 'I'm better than you' speech to him. Sam had heard enough of them from his f- from _John_ , he'd been disowned or done the disowning, whatever - to know what they sounded like. When Snape lapsed into silence, the class was silent in either awe or an unwillingness to test the professor with a superiority complex.

"Potter!" Snape snapped. "What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

Sam knew this, it was in his book - Draught of Living Death. He made a note to look up whether it was pronounced 'draft' or 'drought' on his scrap parchment before he looked back up and saw Hermione raising her hand.

"I don't know, sir," Harry was saying.

"Tut, tut," Snape said mockingly. "Fame clearly isn't everything. Let's try again. Potter, where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?"

 _Stomach of a goat, chapter three,_ Sam thought instantly. Hermione's hand was shaking in an effort to make Snape notice her. _That won't end well for her._ Snape's last remark had made it obvious it was a power trip; the giggles he could hear coming from his right cemented that idea.

"I don't know, sir," Harry said again.

"Thought you wouldn't open a book before coming, eh, Potter? What is the difference, Potter, between monkshood and wolfsbane?"

Hermione stood up at that, clearly desperate for approval. Sam wanted to shake her - didn't she get that Snape was repeating 'Potter' so often because he wanted to humiliate him? It wouldn't end well for anyone who got in his way, even if they both knew there was no difference.

"I don't know," Harry said for the third time. "I think Hermione does, though, why don't you try her?"

A few people laughed outright at that. Sam quirked a smile, though he was too wary of drawing Snape's wrath to laugh with them. He hadn't thought a scrawny kid like that would be brave enough to talk back.

"Sit down," Snape snarled at Hermione. He answered his own questions in quick succession, adding that wolfsbane was also known as 'aconite'. "And a point will be taken for your cheek, Potter."

 _Cheek?_ Sam wrote on his scrap.

Snape split them into pairs; Sam ended up with Millicent. They looked at each other. "I'll stew the slugs and crush the fangs if you want to weigh the nettles and measure the quills," Sam suggested.

"Sounds good to me," she said, hopping down off her stool. They collected their ingredients and got to work, reading the directions twice before they began the steps.

Having gotten most of his meals from diners or cans, Sam had never been very good at cooking. Snape walked around as they worked, critiquing. "You're measuring your quills incorrectly, Bulstrode," he said stiffly. "Winchester, your fangs are not nearly fine enough to add to your potion. Continue grinding."

He got to the next table and had just begun to congratulate Draco - rather loudly, Sam thought grumpily - when there was a loud hiss and a plume of green smoke. One of the cauldrons had been melted into a misshapen blob, its contents spreading over the floor quickly. Neville was covered in burns and boils; the rest of the class hastily climbed on their stools to avoid getting any of the mix on their own skin.

"Idiot boy!" Snape cleaned the spilled potion with a snap of his wand. "I suppose you added the porcupine quills before taking the cauldron off the fire? Take him up to the hospital wing, Finnegan." He turned to Harry and Ron. "You - Potter - why didn't you tell him not to add the quills? Though he'd make you look good if he got it wrong, did you? That's another point you've lost for Gryffindor."

Before Harry could make a retort, Ron kicked him where Snape couldn't see. Sam's eyebrows rose and he traded a glance with Millicent, whose own eyes were wide over Snape's punishment.

Neville didn't return to class, though Seamus did. Snape set him to work with Hermione and Lavender, who clearly disliked each other. Sam continued to work with one eye on Snape so he would know when the next barrage of criticism was coming. When they were finally released an hour later, he waited until he and Millicent were almost to the foyer to check if anyone was close to overhear them and say softly, "So. Teacher on a power trip."

"Don't push it," Millicent said just as quietly. "He's got a nasty temper."


	6. The Midnight Duel

The next week passed in much the same way, with two exceptions: Sam turned in his notes on the shield charms to Professor Flitwick, who handed the paper back to him and suggested they begin in November, and they had their first flying lesson. The first time many of them had been on a broom was an unmitigated disaster.

In the time leading up to their class, boasts got more and more unbelievable. Draco claimed he'd been scouted by the Chudley Cannons, not that he'd ever lower himself to work with him - apparently they hadn't won a game, let alone a season, in decades. He also complained incessantly about first-years not being allowed on the teams and bragged about flying all over the countryside, narrowly escaping Muggles. Blaise looked on in amusement and edited Draco's stories freely to be closer to reality, but only in the privacy of the Slytherin common room or dormitory. Pansy and Millicent talked about their favorite Quidditch teams and compared notes on how old they were when they first started learning how to fly. Theodore and Blaise argued over Quidditch stats. Crabbe and Goyle agreed with everything Draco said; Sam had learned by now that getting them to do anything else was like pulling teeth and rarely worth the effort. He even heard stories from the other houses - Ron Weasley wouldn't be quiet about the time he hit someone on an old broom, Terry Boot talked about his youth Quidditch league, and Ernie Macmillan bored the Hufflepuffs in the common room and everyone else between classes with self-important summaries of the books he'd read on the subject.

Sam took a back seat in these discussions. The only two things he knew about Quidditch was that it was a sport and that the teams all had alliterative names. He'd never been on a broom, so he had no stories about flying. He'd never even been on a plane; he'd come over by what he'd been told was called a 'Portkey', which had left him dizzy and nauseous.

Thursday morning dawned as clear as the other autumn days had so far. Draco got another package of candy from his parents and gloated loudly, making the rest of them roll their eyes. Over at the Gryffindor table, Neville held up a red ball. Draco smirked and stood. "See you in class," he said. Crabbe and Goyle stood with him and matched his pace. Sam tracked them with his eyes, a sick feeling in his stomach when he saw them going toward the Gryffindor table instead of out the doors.

Millicent followed his eyes and muttered, "This is gonna end well."

"Someone's gonna get punched," Sam agreed softly.

"Being punched might improve his personality," Theodore said. Blaise snorted in agreement.

Pansy sighed. "We should back him up," she said.

"Why?" Sam asked. "He's a pompous jerk."

"Yeah, but he's Slytherin."

"Getting knocked down a peg or two might convince him to stop giving us a bad name," Blaise said quietly. "I say we let him get knocked around a bit. Pomfrey will put him right if he gets hurt."

"But then he'll get all huffy we didn't help him," Theodore pointed out.

"McGonagall's going over," Pansy said, a clear note of relief in her voice. "We don't have to interfere."

"He's messing with Neville," Sam muttered.

"So?" Theodore asked.

"So, Neville's a nice guy," Sam said.

"What, you're friends with him?" Theodore asked, disbelief coloring his tone.

"Not really," Sam said. "We were in the same compartment on the train. We haven't talked since, but he hasn't done anything to deserve Draco, either."

The rest of his class exchanged looks Sam couldn't interpret. Malfoy dropped something on the table and skulked away.

"We should get to class," Millicent said at last.

There was no mention of that morning at lunch, though conversation was a little strained. Draco didn't seem to notice, too busy telling another story of narrowly escaping Muggles in helicopters. When they finally left to go to their flying lesson, on a flat lawn opposite the forest, everyone was relieved. They loitered on one side of the two lines of brooms until Madam Hooch appeared.

"Well?" she barked. "What are you all waiting for? Everyone stand by a broomstick. Come on, hurry up." They hurried forward; Sam ended up next to one that was ramrod-straight with a few token bristles hanging off the end. "Stick out your right hand over your broom and say 'Up!'"

"UP!" everyone yelled. Sam's broom didn't move. He looked around surreptitiously, relieved to see that only four of the sixteen - Harry, Draco, Theodore, and Seamus - had their brooms in hand. The other dozen students' brooms remained on the ground. Hooch told them to keep trying. Sam did as instructed, even though he thought it was ridiculous. They couldn't just bend over and pick them up?

Finally, they all had their brooms. Hooch showed them how to mount and walked around, correcting them. She passed by Sam without comment, and he privately breathed a sigh of relief. The combat training he had had had taught him exactly where his center of gravity was, so Hooch had nothing to correct him on. Not yet, anyway; Sam was sure that as soon as he got in the air, that would change. She did tell Draco he'd been doing it wrong for however long he'd been riding; Harry and Ron grinned broadly when they overheard, and Sam and Blaise smiled at each other.

When at last everyone had been corrected, Hooch said, "Now, when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground, hard. Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet, and them come straight back down by pushing forward slightly. On my whistle - three - two -"

Neville kicked off early, face the color of oatmeal. He rose fast and got to twenty feet before he slipped sideways and dropped. He landed facedown.

Sam started toward him, but Hooch beat him there. "Broken wrist," she said. "Come on, boy - it's all right, up you get." She rose her voice. "None of you is to move while I take this boy to the hospital wing! You leave those brooms where they are or you'll be out of Hogwarts before you can say 'Quidditch'. Come on, dear." She put her arm around Neville and led him off, clearly sympathetic. Sam guessed that she'd been doing this long enough to have seen most of the rookie mistakes people would make, which made her less likely to snap at somebody for messing up.

Almost the exact opposite of Snape, but then, somebody who power-tripped on eleven-year-olds clearly had some issues.

Draco started laughing. "Did you see his face, the great lump?"

Crabbe and Goyle joined in wholeheartedly; the rest forced smiles and a giggle, except for Sam, who rolled his eyes.

"Shut up, Malfoy," an Indian Gryffindor snapped.

Pansy bristled. "Ooh, sticking up for Longbottom? Never thought _you'd_ like fat little crybabies, Parvati."

"Look!" Draco said, grabbing something from the ground and holding it up triumphantly. It was a small glass ball, about the size of a marble. "It's that stupid thing Longbottom's gran sent him."

"Give it here, Malfoy," Harry said. Sam took two steps forward, ready to intervene if things got nasty.

Draco smiled. "I think I'll leave it somewhere for Longbottom to find - how about up a tree?"

"Oh, give it a rest, Draco," Sam said at the same time Harry yelled, "Give it _here!_ "

Draco jumped on his broom and took off. Sam swore quietly under his breath, words that would have gotten him a beating if he'd repeated them in front of his father. He wasn't confident enough on a broom to go after Draco, and now the situation was truly out of hand. "Come and get it, Potter," Draco yelled.

Hermione's shrill voice pulled his eyes from Draco. "No! Madam Hooch told us not to move - you'll get us all in trouble!"

Harry kicked off anyway, and Sam turned to Blaise. "Get a teacher," he said quietly. "First one you see. They're gonna kill themselves."

"Give it here or I'll knock you off your broom!" Harry yelled.

"Oh, yeah?" Draco called back mockingly.

" _Go_ ," Sam urged Blaise. If one of them fell before a teacher got there, Sam would at least be able to do basic first aid. The others wouldn't.

Blaise took off back to the castle at a run. He had just disappeared into the building when Draco threw the ball high into the air. Harry dove after it and tumbled into the grass.

"HARRY POTTER!" somebody bellowed. Sam turned to see McGonagall running forward, Blaise close on her heels. " _Never_ \- in all my time at Hogwarts - how _dare_ you - might have broken your neck-"

She was angry, no doubt about it. Sam didn't envy Harry, but he'd brought it on himself.

"It wasn't his fault, Professor," Parvati started.

"Be quiet, Miss Patil-"

"But Malfoy-"

"That's _enough,_ Mr. Weasley. Potter, follow me, now." She turned and stalked off, Harry following with slumped shoulders.

As soon as McGonagall was gone, Draco started hooting with laughter. "That'll show him!"

"Oh, shut up," Sam said. "You think Snape's gonna be any more impressed with you?"

The smile fell from Draco's face. "You wouldn't dare tell him."

"I don't need to tell him. McGonagall will. You think she left you alone because she didn't see you?"

Draco looked worried now. He still looked worried when Hooch made it back, looked around, and asked, "Where's Potter?"

"McGonagall needed him for something," Ron said.

"Hmph. All of you, back on your brooms. On my whistle. Three - two -" _Phweet!_

They kicked off together. Sam rose until his toes were just barely brushing the grass. Anxiety spiked in his chest. He had very little control like this.

"Lean forward to come down," Hooch called. Sam breathed a sigh of relief when his feet were flat on the ground. "Again! Up! Higher than before, if you please."

Sam did as instructed, rising until his feet were an inch above the grass. He was one of the lowest in the class.

"Hover," Hooch called. She began moving among them, correcting a grip here and a seat there. When she stopped in front of Sam, she said, "Technically accurate. Rise a little higher."

Sam swallowed and pulled up slightly, rising another inch.

"Oh, come on. Higher than that."

Sam rose another four inches, coming level with her, and she smiled. "There ya go. Moving comes next."

Sam was _not_ looking forward to that.

To his surprise, movement actually made him feel better. Focusing on not falling off and maintaining a steady speed took his mind off whatever it was that was freaking him out. Draco complained about being bored until Hooch told him to be quiet or she'd dock points. By the time the lesson was over, he'd recovered some of his arrogance. Sam, Millicent, Pansy, Theodore, and Blaise, sat at a table in the common room working on their potions essay until it was time for dinner. None of them knew or cared where Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle were.

That apathy decreased sharply when they got to dinner and saw Draco talking to Harry at the Gryffindor table. Blaise followed his train of thought and said, "Don't, mate. He'll make your life miserable. Pick your battles."

Draco strutted away from the Gryffindor table and sat at the Slytherin one. Harry and Ron looked angry. Sam looked at Blaise and said, "Picking battles is what I'm good at. Come on, let's eat."


	7. Halloween

The next morning, Draco's eyes locked on Harry and Ron the moment the moment they came in the Great Hall. He growled, radiating anger and disbelief, but before he could do anything Snape swept by the table and paused in front of him. "Draco. Stay after class today," he ordered.

None of them were privy to what was said, but Draco didn't get back to the common room until curfew for the next week.

The next Friday, a clunch of owls carrying a long, thin box drew attention at breakfast. They dropped the box in front of Harry, probably scattering food everywhere, and took off. A second owl dropped a letter in front of him. They left not five minutes later, carrying the box and grinning excitedly. Draco followed them, and Sam stood.

"Sam. Pick your battles," Blaise said.

"I’m picking this one," Sam said. "You wanna let their stupid little rivalry spill over into actual damage?"

He made it to the foyer just in time to hear Draco say to Ron, "I suppose you and your brothers have to save up twig by twig."

Sam opened his mouth to tell Draco to back off, but he was beaten to the punch by Flitwick, who suddenly appeared at Draco's elbow. "Not arguing, I hope, boys?"

"Potter's been sent a broomstick, Professor," Draco rushed out.

"Yes, yes, that's right. Professor McGonagall told me all about the special circumstances, Potter. And what model is it?"

"A Nimbus Two Thousand, sir. And it's really thanks to Malfoy here that I've got it." He and Ron turned and walked away, as did Flitwick. Draco left, too, but Sam barely noticed it.

His head was spinning. The only event he could come up with involving Harry, Draco, and brooms was the flying lesson, but that didn't make sense. He had assumed Harry would be punished, much the way Draco had been. Had he been rewarded instead?

By the time Halloween rolled around, Sam still hadn't figured it out. This was his first Halloween away from his family. Most people's too, probably, but most people hadn't had their mother murdered right around now.

He woke that morning and seriously considered skipping his morning run. This time of the year was always hard. His f - _John_ and Dean were always angry, and Jon was always drunk. He'd always had to tread carefully for the last week of October and first week of November so as not to get either riled up.

He got up. He wasn't with them anymore, and hadn't been for almost four months. It was time to put them behind him.

It was cold now, and his breath puffed out of him in white puffs. He ran anyway, pushing himself harder and farther, trying to outrun his father's phantom words in his ear. It didn't work, and when he finished his first lap he kept going. Another half of one wouldn't kill him.

In Charms, they began learning to hover objects. They were each given a feather to practice on. Sam had done this over the summer in Diagon Alley, practicing on stones he found in the street, so his feather floated as soon as he said the spell. His classmates didn't have the same result - Millicent's feather caught fire, Draco's stayed where it was, Crabbe's actually burrowed down into the table. The Ravenclaws were having similar issues. Flitwick came around, correcting pronunciation and wand movements. By the end of the period, half the class had succeeded. Flitwick told them to practice and released them for lunch.

At the end of Transfiguration, Sam was almost to the hall when he heard something unusual down a side hallway. He turned off from the group.

"Hey!" Pansy said. "Where are you going?"

"Oh - uh - just want to see something. You go ahead."

"Suit yourself," she said, turning and continuing on with the others.

Sam went down the hallway. Now he was closer, he could hear better. He knew that sound.

Someone was crying.

He found the door outside which the crying was loudest and almost went in, but then he hesitated. It was the girls' bathroom.

 _Compromise,_ he told himself, and knocked twice. "Hello?" he said tentatively. "Are you all right?"

The crying got louder. Sam glanced around uneasily. They were in a side hallway, and everyone was going to the feast. He slipped inside.

"Are you all right?" he repeated.

A stall at the end unlocked and a familiar girl poked her head out. "S-Sam?"

"Hermione?" He blinked. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine." She sniffled. "Why aren't you at the feast?"

"I heard you all the way out there," he said. "I wanted to make sure you were okay."

"Oh. No, you didn't. I thought I had it under control, so I - I started to leave, but I can't - I can't stop."

"What happened?" he asked.

"Oh, just - boys being boys, I suppose -"

Sam got a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. "What happened?" he repeated.

"Ron. Ron said something stupid, and now I can't stop crying, and I just - I hate it here, Sam, I'm a Muggle-born and I'm so far behind and everyone hates me and I'm supposed to hate you and I just - I just -" She choked on her words and covered her face with her hands.

Sam pulled her into a hug a little awkwardly. "It's okay," he said. "It's okay. We'll stay here until you calm down, and then we'll go to the feast. It's okay."

Hermione just cried harder.

She was showing no sign of stopping when there was an ominous _thump_ outside. She squeaked. Sam carefully separated from her and said, "It's okay. It's gonna be-"

The door banged open and closed, and Sam turned to see who it was, defenses for being in the girl's bathroom springing to his lips and withering on his tongue.

The new occupant was twelve feet tall and smelled like a dumpster. A tiny head sat on massive shoulders; its belly was gigantic and round. The thing's skin was gray as stone. Sam didn't know what it was or what it wanted, but the wickedly spiked club in its hand spelled trouble.

"Get in a stall," he said, pulling his knife. He wasn't sure what damage the blade could do, but the club in the thing's hand was not something he wanted to mess with.

Hermione whimpered, and he wasted a precious second shoving her inside the stall she'd come out of when Sam had first come in. She fell with a scream.

The scream galvanized the thing into action. It brought the club swinging toward Sam in an arc that took out two sinks. Sam ducked underneath it and ran forward, aiming for the belly with his knife. A belly-cut would hopefully hurt the thing badly enough to fall, and then he could get at its neck.

That plan failed when his knife glanced off the skin with a _snrrk_ he was used to hearing when he sharpened it. The skin didn't just _look_ like rock; it _was_ rock. What choice did that leave him?

The troll backed up to look down at him with dully interested eyes. That was it - eyes didn't have a protective coating. But how to get up there?

Something thunked off its head and bounced off - a piece of plumbing. He looked around wildly, trying to find its source, but was forced to duck under its club again when it swung around. Someone began shouting at it, providing him with a distraction.

This was his chance. He backed up a few feet, got a running start, and jumped. He landed halfway up its back and pulled himself up on rock-hard folds of skin until he was positioned with his arms gripping onto its shoulders. Now he could see - Harry and Ron had come in, and both were holding pieces of the destroyed sinks. He didn't have time to worry about them; he probably only had a few seconds before the thing realized he was there. Sam let go with his right hand and arced it forward to stab the knife back toward him. It scraped off its cheek; the thing gnashed its teeth, catching his arm but letting it go immediately. Sam pulled his arm back before it could realize it had actually gotten him. The good thing about its skin being so tough was that he could wrap an arm under its neck and get a good thing on a thick ridge. Had it been slicker, Sam would have had a much harder time staying on.

"Run!" he yelled at Harry and Ron, checking his placement before letting fly this time. His knife buried in the thing's right eye up to its hilt and he yanked it out, sending blood and bits of solid gore flying.

It bellowed in pain and staggered back. Sam had a split second to realize what it was going to do to and jump free. He landed awkwardly against a sink and felt something in his side snap. No time to deal with that now, and thank God for adrenaline or he wouldn't be able to move at all. Broken ribs hurt like hell. He lurched forward and got the blade in its left eye, too, completely blinding it.

It bellowed and spasmed. Its arm knocked Sam away, and he hit the wall with a _thud_ he barely registered over the sudden pain in his head. He slid down to the ground, completely unable to support his weight, and closed his eyes against the nausea.

Hermione spoke first. "Is it - dead?" she asked timidly.

"Don't know," Sam wheezed. "Get out of here before we find out."

"I'm not going to leave you here," she said indignantly, but before she could say anything else, the door slammed open. Sam turned his head and opened his eyes to see McGonagall, Snape, and Quirrell coming in. Sam couldn't see what Quirrell did, but Snape bent over the troll.

"What on earth were you thinking of?" McGonagall demanded. Sam closed his eyes, but couldn't help the whimper that escaped. Her voice, shrill with anger, drilled right into the center of his brain.

He felt, more than heard, someone kneel in front of him. "Winchester," a low voice said, "open your eyes. Now."

Sam obeyed, opening his eyes to mere slits. Snape was in front of him, reaching out to grab his chin. "How bad?" he asked.

"You three," McGonagall began.

"Minerva," Snape said lowly, "we can perhaps wait until the bleeding has stopped in my student's brain. Take them to the hospital wing and get them checked over. Where else are you hurt?" he asked Sam.

"Ribs," he exhaled. "It bit my arm. Hit my back and head pretty hard when I jumped off."

"Why did you jump?" Snape asked, pulling out his wand.

Sam could hear McGonagall rounding up the Gryffindors. "It was gonna fall on me. I stabbed it and it started falling, so I had to jump. I couldn't let it land on me." He knew he was rambling, but he didn't really care. The world around him was becoming pleasantly blurred.

"Lean forward," Snape ordered. Sam felt his hands dancing over the back of his skull, and then something soft press and hold. "Dressing," Snape said, which didn't make sense at all. "I'm going to have to hover you. Didn't want you to bleed out on the way to the hospital wing."

Sam made a small noise of understanding; Snape leaned him back against the wall and stood. He flicked his wand and Sam rose to hover horizontal beside him. "Quirrell," Snape said, "get Albus."

Quirrell scurried out ahead of them. They made the trek to the infirmary in silence, for which Sam was grateful. He wasn't sure how much noise his poor brain could take before it exploded.

"Sit," McGonagall ordered her charges as soon as they were inside. "I will deal with you three later."

"Get Poppy," Snape said, settling Sam onto a bed on his front. He made a wordless noise of pain when his ribs protested and was ignored.

"What's this?" another woman's voice demanded - loudly, Sam thought grumpily.

"You should see the troll," Snape said with sleekly vicious amusement.

"What do you - _oh._ Is this the hunter boy?"

"Hunter?" one of the other boys blurted, voice rising a few octaves. "He's a _hunter?_ "

"Use your head, Weasley," McGonagall snapped. "How else would an eleven-year-old have bested a troll?"

Something dripped along Sam's scalp and stung like fire. He bit the wrist closest to his mouth to keep from screaming out. Something small and hard poked his back, and his ribs shifted painfully. "Two broken," the new woman said crisply. Her voice didn't hurt as much as it originally had, and nor did his side. "Roll over."

Sam did as requested, flipping himself on the small bed. The new woman took his arm in her left hand, pointed her wand at the troll bite, and muttered something that sounded Greek. The skin fused together, not even leaving a scar.

She handed him two bottles. "Drink," she said crisply.

Sam paused. "What's in these?" he asked suspiciously.

"Painkiller and something to fight an infection," she said primly. "I cleaned the wound, but if it's already in the bloodstream you'll need prophylaxis."

"How much?"

"All of it," Snape said.

Sam swallowed and uncorked the first bottle. He gagged on his first mouthful of the liquid - it tasted like rancid socks. He forced himself to finish swallowing.

The second one tasted just as horrible, but by the time he'd finished, his head had finished pounding. He swallowed convulsively to get the taste out of his mouth. "Thanks," he said when he could feel his tongue again.

The woman - she must be 'Poppy' - sniffed and took the bottles back. "A fine thing, when trolls are loose in the school," she said scathingly.

"We were searching for it," McGonagall said tartly. "Now. You four. What happened?"

"I am curious, as well," Dumbledore said. Sam jumped; he hadn't heard the old man come in. "Hermione. Why don't you tell us what happened?"

Hermione outlined hastily, tripping over her words. Ron had said something to upset her, and she'd gone to the bathroom to calm down. Sam had heard and gone to comfort her (at this, Snape shot Sam a look of faint surprise), and it was then the troll came in. Sam shoved her into a stall and tried to stab its belly, then ducked the club when a tap bounced off its head. He jumped on its back and went for the eyes. Then the teachers showed up.

Ron, Harry, and Sam told much the same story. Dumbledore listened gravely to all four renditions and then said, "No lasting harm has been done, so we will consider this matter closed. Five points to each Gryffindor and thirty to Slytherin for courage and strength."

When Dumbledore stood, Sam realized he was about to leave. "Can I get my knife back?" he blurted before he could stop himself. "Sir."

Dumbledore's blue eyes pinned him, and Sam felt almost violated by the stare. It was like they were penetrating him, staring into the depths of his soul to learn the unincriminating fact that it had been the first knife he'd owned.

"Yes," Dumbledore said at last.

"Albus," McGonagall said. "I really must protest. A school is no place for knives!"

"It's a good thing he had one tonight, or your students would have been killed," Snape said sharply. "They owe their lives to a Slytherin."

McGonagall said, "This isn't about houses, Severus. This is about the safety of our students."

"My word," said Dumbledore, "is final. Harry, Ron Hermione, I trust you will keep Sam's status to yourselves?"

"Status?" Harry and Hermione repeated blankly, but Ron recoiled. "He's a hunter!"

"He's also a student," Dumbledore said mildly.

"He _kills_ us!"

"Has he killed anyone?" Dumbledore asked mildly. "Sam, have you ever hunted witches?"

Sam swallowed uncomfortably. "No," he lied, sounding unconvincing even to his own ears.

McGonagall shot him a sharp look, but nobody else seemed to notice anything amiss. The Gryffindors were sent off to their common room with another sharp admonishment and McGonagall and Dumbledore departed. Snape looked at him. "Are you capable of walking to the dungeons?" he asked.

"Yes, sir," Sam said.

"Then come." Snape stood and turned, black robes billowing behind him dramatically. Sam hopped off the bed and followed.

The hallways were deserted. Sam had to half-jog to keep up with Snape's long strides, though he didn't really mind. He spent the time replaying the fight in his head, mentally reviewing what he'd learned and what he could have done better.

Jumping onto a sink and then onto the troll's shoulders might have given him a better vantage point. Aiming _before_ he'd struck the first time would have prevented the bite. Looking before he leapt could have saved him the head injury.

Snape stopped at the top of the stairs and gestured for Sam to follow him into his office. They lowered themselves into chairs on opposite sides of the desk, leaned back, and asked, "Why?"

"Why what?"

"Why did any of this happen?"

Sam blinked. "Because a troll got in?" he ventured.

Snape scowled at him. "Why did you fight it?"

"Because it was going to kill us both?" Sam really didn't know what he was getting at.

"Are you being deliberately difficult?"

"No! I just don't know what you want from me."

"Fine. Why did you go into that bathroom?"

"I heard someone crying."

"And that was the only reason?"

"Yeah. Yes," he amended at Snape's glare.

"It wasn't because you went looking for the troll?"

Sam blinked. "I didn't even know there _was_ a troll."

"You expect me to believe," Snape said, placing awful emphasis on the words, "that you missed Professor Quirrell screaming and fainting in the middle of the Great Hall?"

"I haven't been in the Great Hall since lunch," Sam told him.

"How did you know how to kill a troll? They are uncommon in the western hemisphere."

"If something's skin is too hard to cut, you look for softer areas. Eyes, ears, mouth."

"This was your first troll?"

"Yes, sir."

"And you killed it alone and surrounded by collateral."

"Yes, sir."

"The official story will be that you never met the troll. You stayed with Granger until we found you and sent you back. Weasley and Potter snuck off to fight it but were caught before they got far. Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir." Sam chafed at the lie, but he knew why it was necessary. Ron's reaction to hearing he was a hunter had brought home what he had been told: wizards hated and feared them, even the children. He didn't want Ron's reaction to become his reality.

"The feast has been moved to the common rooms. Go."

Sam left.


	8. Quidditch

It got cold enough in November for the lake to freeze. When Sam went for his runs, the icy grass cracked beneath his feet. Sam became very good at running on wet and frozen ground. When Snape began limping, Sam wrote it off as a fall on slippery ground; he'd already sprained an ankle. Partway through the month, the Weasley twins spelled snowballs to hit Quirrell in the back of the head repeatedly until McGonagall caught them.

November also marked the beginning of Quidditch season. While flying lessons had continued (with thankfully fewer injuries) and Sam had gotten more comfortable on a broom, he really didn't _enjoy_ flying. He was curious to see how people who _did_ enjoy it flew.

But first, he had to get through his extra Charms lesson, which mostly consisted of Flitwick sending a spell at him and Sam trying to block it. He had gotten a few weak shields up, but they shivered and dissolved under a tickling charm. After his fifteenth failed attempt, he sighed in disgust and asked, "What am I doing wrong?"

Flitwick frowned and said, "Stand over here and turn sideways."

Sam walked to be in front of the desk Flitwick was standing on and turned to be in profile.

"Let me see the motion."

Sam jabbed and twisted, much like he would with a dagger to cut out a heart, and Flitwick said, "You're using an offensive motion."

Sam dropped his hand. "Stab and spin is offense," he said.

"Yes, but this spell is for defense. Watch." Sam looked obediently down at Flitwick's tiny arm as he jabbed and turned. "You see? If you move offensively, you will achieve offense. If you move defensively, you will achieve defense. Try again."

"Protego," Sam said, jabbing and turning. It flickered into existence and dissolved after three seconds - the longest it had held.

"Good," Flitwick said. "Again."  
***  
Saturday morning, the day of the first Quidditch match, dawned cold and clear. It was late enough in the year that the sun rose around the time Sam was running, and it occurred to him he should look to see if there was a way to create light or trap warmth. He was just barely warm enough to move even after ten minutes of flat-out running in his old coat. If he couldn't find one, he'd have to give up his running; it just wasn't worth running the risk of hypothermia or frostbite.

Breakfast was louder than usual, with everyone talking excitedly about the match. Nobody knew who Gryffindor's 'seeker' was, whatever that meant. He made the mistake of asking Millicent, who instantly went off about catching someone she called a snitch. Sam was immediately sorry for asking.

He went to the game mostly out of curiosity, but he was in the minority. The whole school turned out, screaming in excitement and bloodlust. The screams only got louder when the teams took the field, and louder still when they took off. He was sure there was commentary somewhere, but he couldn't hear anything.

A ball went through a hoop, and everyone around Sam screamed in anger. On the other side of the field, the Gryffindors went wild, waving pennants and scarves. They'd scored against Slytherin, then.

The cheers died down some, after that, and Sam caught flashes of the commentary: "Slytherin in possession - Pucey...Weasleys and...wait...snitch?"

Two blurs, one red and one green, dove down. Sam watched them in interest; weren't they afraid of falling off?

A speck of green body-checked the red, send it careening off course. The Gryffindor side of the stadium screamed "Foul!"; Hooch said something to the green that had run into the red; Gryffindor got a free shot.

"So - after that obvious...foul...kills...penalty...Spinnet…."

Sam stopped trying to listen and just watched. The ball went through the hoop, adding to Gryffindor's score, and play resumed. The cannonballs pelted around, trying to hit people, and two players on each time sent them spinning away toward their opponents. A Slytherin got the ball and raced toward the hoops in front of which hovered a Gryffindor. One of the cannonballs hit the Slytherin in the face, but he kept going. He scored, and the Slytherins around him screamed in celebration.

Other people screamed for another reason. Sam followed their pointing fingers and the bottom dropped out of his stomach.

Someone was about to fall. He was dangling from the broom by one hand, and the broom was bucking, trying to throw him off. He stood without realizing what he was doing. Two other red blurs sped toward the dangler, but whenever they got too close the broom jerked away. After three attempts they began circling below him - to catch him, Sam realized. Whose idea _was_ this game?

"Is this normal?" he whispered to Millicent.

"No," she answered. "Nothing can mess with a broomstick like Potter's got, not anything we learn here. It's hard to tamper with a broom."

So it was Harry up there. Sam swallowed. Harry suddenly got back onto his broom and sped downward, for which Sam couldn't blame him. He'd be eager to get back on solid ground, too.

Then Harry put a hand to his mouth, reached the ground, landed on all fours, and dry-heaved. He yelled something and held a glint of gold above his head.

"I don't believe it," Pansy said disbelievingly. "Potter caught the snitch."

In bed that night, Sam worried. Millicent had said they didn't learn how to tamper with a broom at Hogwarts, which meant it had been a teacher or visiting student to try to kill Harry. He didn't think they had any visiting students, and besides, the only one he'd heard to have a grudge against him was Draco, and that was hurt pride over Harry not shaking his hand on the train. That just left the teachers, not all of whom he knew and none of whom he could match.

Which one?


	9. Break

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Covers the events of chapters 12-14 (Mirror of Erised, Nicolas Flamel, Norbert the Norwegian Ridgeback)

Christmas approached quickly. Sam finally managed the shield charm the first week of December, for which Flitwick praised him profusely. Students usually didn't learn that spell until fourth year, he said, and now they could move on to the more interesting shield charms.

He'd given up on his morning runs - it was just too cold. Instead, he spent an hour doing push-ups, sit-ups, and any other exercise he could think of before showering and getting ready for the day. The common room and the Great Hall had fires as large as the one Sam's family had made when a hotel was being haunted by a ghost and there was no way to narrow down the five suspects, so they had piled all five corpses together and burned the pile. Sam still had vivid nightmares about that night, when all five ghosts had attacked at once and there were only two shotguns to wield. Not one of them had escaped unscathed.

Draco tried and failed to make people laugh with a mean-spirited joke about Harry being replaced with a frog. They'd been treated to three straight nights of him ranting about 'precious Potter' in front of the fireplace before Sam finally snapped and told him to get over himself. That the other first-years save Crabbe and Goyle had made it abundantly clear they sided with Sam had convinced Draco to shut up.

A week before the break, a seventh-year came around to each room before breakfast. "If anyone's staying for Christmas, write your name down," he told them, sounding bored. Sam scribbled his name.

In Potions on the last day before their break, Draco said, "I do feel so sorry for all those people who have to stay at Hogwarts for Christmas because they're not wanted at home."

He was looking at Harry as he said it, but Sam felt it like a punch to the gut. He tightened his fingers on the scale he was using to measure powdered lionfish spine and told himself, _Don't let him get to you. You've had worse._

They had an extra half hour between class and lunch that day so the Great Hall could be decorated, so he, Theodore, Blaise, Millicent, and Pansy went back to the common room. They tried to teach him Exploding Snap, and by the time they left the common room, they all had minor burns but were laughing.

The rest of his House left the next morning, and the Slytherin common room was suddenly empty and lonely. Sam stoked the fire to roaring for the company and sat by it, practicing the shield charms he was trying to learn. The problem was that there was nothing to test them against and they were invisible, so he really didn't know if he was getting them right.

He remembered his long-ago thought of warmth and light spells and spent two days in the library looking them up. He found several dozen suggestions for each and chose to concentrate on the ones marked 'easiest', and by the time Christmas rolled around he'd mastered both 'Lumos' and 'Calor'.

Over the break, he got an idea of who had stayed. All of the Weasleys, which meant the Gryffindor table was boisterous at every meal. Harry Potter, who had clearly been adopted by the redheads, was there as well. So, too, was an older student with blue trim on her robes who brought a book to every meal and got at least one letter a morning. No Hufflepuff had stayed. Sam was the only Slytherin.

Isolation weighed heavily on him. When he tried to join the Gryffindor table the second day, thinking the troll might have forged the kind of tolerance Harry and Ron had found with Hermione, the older Weasleys had sneered him off. The Ravenclaw was so absorbed in her book Sam didn't even try.

He woke on Christmas morning and just stayed in bed for a while, trying to summon up a good Christmas memory. They were all overshadowed by his father's commands or absence. Dean had tried, but he was too young to do much of anything to help. He'd stolen presents when Sam was eight, he remembered. Dad had left them alone and Dean had stolen him a Barbie doll. Sam had given him a necklace he kept tucked under his shirt so Dad didn't see and so that the thing they were hunting wouldn't have a convenient choking mechanism. Dinner had been stale bread and peanut butter.

Things were different now. He was alone, for one. For two, he could already smell baking food. He wouldn't go to bed hungry tonight - in fact, he hadn't gone to bed hungry in _months._ He knew where he was sleeping, he knew where his next meal was coming from, he knew that his friends would return alive and unscarred. It was a luxury he'd been denied as long as he could remember.

But what about his family? Were they even still alive? Were they hurt and dying in some lonely forest, slowly starving or dehydrating to death because nobody knew where they were? He was on the other side of the planet, and they were out eliminating threats while he learned magic and enjoyed the comfort of routine and safety.

Eventually, he forced himself to get out of bed, shower, and dress. When he got back out, he noticed the small pile of brown-wrapper boxes sitting in the middle of the room. Frowning, he reached out to pick one up.

_To: Sam  
From: Millicent_

He turned the package and slit the tape with a fingernail. A book fell into his hands, with a note taped to the front: 

_Happy Christmas, Sam! I didn't explain the game well, and I figured you'd appreciate this more. Hope you're enjoying yourself!  
Millicent_

Sam pulled the note off and read the title: _Quidditch for Beginners._

He dropped his hand to his sides and stared at the boxes. Were they all for him?

The nametags said they were. Draco had sent him a box of assorted candy, Blaise a Slytherin scarf, Pansy gloves. Theodore gave him a twelve-pack of thick socks. There was another box from Millicent with thick gloves.

Sam swallowed hard. They'd noticed. They'd noticed him shivering in classrooms and hallways, how he sat close to the fire wherever there was one, and that he didn't have a scarf or gloves or warm socks. And they hadn't made a big deal out of it; they'd sent him what he needed as Christmas gifts, so he couldn't turn them away without looking foolish or mean. And they hadn't all sent him the same thing, so they'd _planned_ it.

He was _so_ lucky, and he hadn't even gotten them anything in return.

Sam swallowed again and refused to let himself cry. He was too blessed to cry. Instead he sent up a silent prayer of thanks to any angels with their ears on and spent the time until lunch curled in the common room with the Quidditch book. Seven hundred ways to commit a foul, and all had happened in a 1473 World Cup. People had vanished and reappeared in the Sahara. People had _died._ And still it was played.

Wizards were dumber than rocks. It was the only explanation.

At last, it was time for lunch. Sam's stomach complained, bringing him faint amusement. How long had it been since he'd last gone sixteen hours without a meal? He was getting soft.

Hogwarts apparently did its dinner at lunchtime on Christmas. Sam sat alone in front of a roast turkey, boiled and roasted potatoes, sausages, peas, gravy, cranberry sauce, and stuffing. There was a heap of some kind of package to his right. Over at the Gryffindor table, everyone was wearing a sweater. Ron and Harry were the only ones with sweaters that _didn’t_ have letters on them. Someone - Mrs. Weasley, maybe - had clearly knitted them all. They were a boisterous group. Even the Ravenclaw sat with them, apparently putting her books away for the day. Sam itched to join them, but he remembered the last time he'd tried to sit with them and stayed away, eating desultorily and trying not to let his longing show.

Harry and the Weasley with an 'F' on his front pulled apart one of the colorful packages and it went off with a loud noise in a cloud of smoke. Sam convulsively gripped the knife on his leg - true to Dumbledore's word, it had been put back in his suitcase the day after Halloween - but forced himself to calm down when he heard the laughter. He glanced up at the teachers' table and saw Dumbledore was wearing a flower bonnet.

A dessert appeared on the table. It was on fire. Sam bit back a strangled yell and fell backwards off the bench. "Jumpy enough?" someone yelled from the Gryffindor table when he stood, to much laughter. Ron and Harry both looked vaguely guilty, and though he didn't look, he could feel teachers' eyes on him. Waiting for him to pick a fight?

("Perhaps we should have warned him," McGonagall said quietly to Dumbledore.

"Perhaps," he agreed, thoughtful eyes on the boy, who didn't seem to notice.)

Sam ignored them and took a small serving of the no-longer-flaming dessert. It was strange, but good, and he found out there was money inside when he bit down hard on silver and pulled out a sickle.

Yeah. Wizards were _stupid._

He left shortly after, not in the mood to see everyone else having fun while he sat alone. He finished the Quidditch book between lunch and dinner, debated the merits of skipping the meal, and decided that if he did that the Weasleys would think they'd won whatever game they were playing. He ate a turkey sandwich and a slice of cake, ignoring the English muffins.

He'd had good food, gotten some incredible presents, and not had to fight for his life. It was the best Christmas he'd ever had.

In bed that night, he turned to the photo and brushed a thumb over his dead mother's face. _What would you think of me now?_  
***  
The snow stayed on the ground for the rest of break. Sam took the chance to try out his other Christmas gifts and his warming charms, and managed to take a long walk around the lake without getting frostbite.

When he entered the foyer, Dumbledore smiled at him. "Hello, Sam."

"Hello, sir," Sam said quietly.

"Do you have a minute? I'd like to speak with you."

"Of course," he said automatically.

"Follow me." Dumbledore led him to a gargoyle statue on the second floor. "Bertie Bott's," he said clearly.

The gargoyle jumped to the side, revealing a staircase that slowly rotated. Sam and Dumbledore stepped onto it and let it carry them up to a door, which Dumbledore opened to reveal a round room covered with bookshelves. An oak desk sat in the middle of the room; beside it was a golden perch for a bird.

"Have a seat," Dumbledore invited. Sam sank into one of the overstuffed armchairs in front of the desk, and Dumbledore sat in the one behind it. "Lemon drop?" he offered, holding a glass container of yellow candy out to him.

"No thanks."

Dumbledore popped one in his mouth and set it back down on the desk. "How are you getting along, Sam?"

"I'm okay, sir."

Dumbledore peered at him over his glasses and asked, "Have you given any thought to what you'll do this summer?"

"N-No, sir," Sam said, fear hollowing his stomach. He'd just _assumed_ he'd stay at the Leaky Cauldron again, but that didn't - why would they spend money on him? Surely there was a wizard orphanage or something.

His face must have shown something of his thoughts, because Dumbledore said, "You could, of course, stay at the Leaky Cauldron again. That's no place for an active young boy, however, so I am suggesting a compromise."

"What compromise?" Sam asked, suspicion ratcheting up.

Dumbledore leaned forward. "There are a few hunters - a _very_ few - who know of our world and coexist with it. They do not bother the Ministry, and the Ministry does not bother them. Should you agree, we will try to put you with a hunter couple. You could hunt over the summer and return in September. I cannot guarantee your safety, but you know how dangerous hunting can be. It is up to you - 'your call', as I believe they say."

Sam half-smiled and thought. As Dumbledore had said, he could stay at the Leaky Cauldron, but he was alone there. He had nothing to do for the entire summer except read books and find hunts he could take with a dwindling supply of ammo. On the other hand, spending his summer running around with a bunch of hunters, killing and fighting for his life every night, sounded a lot like what he'd changed continents to get away from.

His family had sucked. He'd hated fighting by their sides to kill things. He'd hated being the screw-up. He'd hated moving all the time and not knowing if or when he'd eat on any given day. But when he'd gone after the troll, he'd been the one to take the risk, and he'd been the one to take it down, and he hadn't screwed up. He couldn't deny taking a certain amount of pride from that. Maybe it wasn't the hunting he hated - maybe it was the forced inability to make friends and being the scapegoat that grated on him.

He took a breath. "As long as they know I'm not new to this," he said carefully, "I think I'd like to give the hunters a try."

Dumbledore smiled at him. "Excellent. I'll arrange it with the Ministry. Now, regarding your schoolwork. Your teachers agree you're making satisfactory progress. Professor Flitwick reports you've mastered a shield charm?"

When he paused, Sam realized he was waiting for an answer. "Yes, sir."

"Unusual, for your age. However, Professor McGonagall tells me you've been distracted. Professor Snape has been watching you closely since your assignment, and he tells me that while you get along with your housemates, you aren't close with any of them. Is that right?"

Sam shifted uncomfortably. "That depends on your definition of 'close', sir," he said quietly.

Dumbledore nodded, like he'd been expecting that answer. "And your distraction in Transfiguration?"

"I - over the summer, I read through my books and worked ahead," Sam admitted. "I didn't want to be behind."

"I see. Did you do this with all of your classes?"

"Yes, sir."

"So you're bored in all of your classes?"

"Yes, sir. Except Potions, but I couldn't do a lot of practical work with that over the summer."

Dumbledore smiled. "That would be difficult, wouldn't it?" Sam smiled, too, ducking his head shyly. He was dismissed soon after.

The rest of his house came back the day before the semester started. They chattered about their Christmases, comparing gifts and families. Blaise told them about his little brother, now four, who had been excited about the colors more than the gifts. Pansy's extended family had come over, including her little nieces and nephews, and she'd spent the break playing with them. She clearly loved them, and it showed on her face.

"What about you?" Draco asked Sam at one point. "Get any letters from America?"

"Nah," Sam said. The look on the other boy's face told him there was pure malice behind the question, which bewildered him. He hadn't really done anything to Draco, so his disdain was off-putting. "Thanks for the candy, by the way. It was nice," he added. He'd already thanked the others for their warm clothes; they'd brushed off his thanks and embarrassment that he hadn't gotten them anything.

The semester began, and with it came the resumption of homework. Sam found a pack of fifty black pens left by the seat he used in Potions, and winked at Hermione when he caught her eye. She winked back and turned to her cauldron again.

The Slytherin first-years claimed a table off to the side of the common room, a large round one where they could spread out their books all turned to different pages so they didn't have to keep flipping back and forth. They discussed their papers, sometimes getting into arguments, sometimes agreeing, sometimes devolving into games. Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle were standoffish and rarely joined them, for which none of them were sorry.

It was during a particularly exciting game of Gobstones that Sam laughed and said, "You did that on purpose, Millie!"

"Millie?" she repeated, eyebrows raising, a smile appearing on her face.

"Sorry," Sam said.

"No, it's okay. Millie. I like it."

"How come she gets a nickname? Got a crush, Sam?" Theodore teased.

Sam smirked. "Only if I've got a crush on you, too, _Theo_."

They all dissolved into laughter.

In Defense, they moved on to werewolves; in Transfiguration, they began turning books into mice; in Charms they learned the tickling charm; they had moved on to making their own star maps in Astronomy; History of Magic was still on the goblin wars; they were beginning transplant basics in Herbology; and Sam had mastered another shield charm by February. Flitwick told him he was making excellent progress, which cheered Sam immensely. 

However, in the first month and a half of spring semester, Sam began to miss his brother with a sort of dull ache. Dean had always treated him as fairly as he could. He'd done his best to protect him, had stolen for him, had provided meals when Sam was too young to have a concept of 'money'. When Sam ha had nightmares (which had actually slacked off some at the beginning of the year but had now returned to their previous levels), Dean had comforted him. He wasn't perfect, of course, but nobody was. Sam missed him deeply.

He knew he couldn't write to his family. He was in a different hemisphere solely to keep them from tracking him down and _killing him_. He just...he missed his brother.

One Saturday in mid-March, when Sam realized he only had a month left before school, Dumbledore sent him a note at breakfast: 

_The Ministry has agreed to the placement. There is a couple willing to meet you this afternoon. If you are amenable, come to my office immediately following breakfast. The password is still 'Bertie Bott's'._

_Professor Dumbledore_

Sam looked up at the teachers' table and gave a small nod. Dumbledore smiled at him and nodded back.

"What's that about?" Theo asked him.

"Oh, just - finding a place to put me this summer," Sam explained. They knew by now that asking more questions would result in deflections, so they let it drop.

After breakfast, he found himself back in Dumbledore's office. An unfamiliar man in khakis, a pink shirt, and a lime-green bowler hat turn to look at him when he came in. An oversized bird took one look at Sam and flew off his perch. Dumbledore sat behind his desk, the stranger in front of it.

"Ah, Sam," Dumbledore said warmly. "How nice to see you. There are a few things we need to discuss before you leave. This is the Minister of Magic, Cornelius Fudge."

"Hi," Sam said, unsure of the proper form of address.

"Hello," Fudge said shortly.

"Sam, why don't you have a seat, and we can begin," Dumbledore suggested. "Would you care for a lemon drop?"

"No, thank you, sir," Sam said, settling into one of the armchairs.

"Very well, then. Cornelius?"

"There are several rules you will need to adhere to over this summer," Fudge began. Dumbledore set down the dish of candy. "First is that you cannot use magic, except in life-threatening circumstances, and then only the very minimum. You are allowed to brew potions provided they do not involve incantations. Your behavior is to be above reproach. These hunters are taking you in at some risk to themselves."

That made sense. They didn't know if he'd be a help or a hindrance, and being willing to let him join them was a risk on their part. Any time a new person, no matter how experienced, joined a team, there was some shuffling of roles and a period in which nobody was quite sure how to act. He remembered when Caleb had joined them the first few times, how neither he nor Dean were quite sure of what part they played. They'd found their groove eventually, but there was always a shake-up.

Fudge continued, "They will be given a stipend each month for your needs, and they will write an end-of-summer report on how you behaved. Their report will determine whether you are given this chance in the future. That means no pranks and mind yourself. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"We'll be off, then. Albus?"

"I must stay here. There is a staff meeting this morning, and I would be wise to attend."

"Fine. Come along, Winchester." Fudge stood and moved toward the fireplace; Sam followed him. When Fudge thrust a container of powder at him, Sam blinked down at it; when Fudge shook it impatiently, Sam realized he was supposed to _do_ something with it.

"Um," he said awkwardly. "What-"

"It's Floo powder," Dumbledore said from behind him, sounding amused.

Fudge sighed. "Take a handful. Throw it in the fire, step in, and say 'Ministry of Magic'." He shook the container again.

Step _into_ the fire? Why would he do that? He had a healthy respect for fire; he knew exactly how destructive it could be. But then, it wouldn't be the most ridiculous thing he'd seen since coming to Hogwarts.

He took a deep breath to steel himself before he did as instructed. Soot invaded his nose and mouth as soon as he stepped inside the fireplace, but he wasn't being burned. In fact, it was almost a pleasant sensation, warm and tingling on his calves; glancing down, he saw the flames were now green.

"Ministry of Magic," he croaked through his now-dry throat, and then he was _spinning_ , flashes of light and snatches of sound passing in front of him. His arm hit something hard and he tucked it against himself with a hiss of pain. It went on, and on, and on-

And then he fell forward, barely getting his arms out in time to take the brunt of the fall on his palms. He coughed roughly and staggered to his feet. As soon as he could open his eyes, he looked around.

The room he was in was larger than even the Great Hall and done entirely in marble. There was a fountain with all kinds of magical creatures in the very center of the room, and a knot of adults in robes who glanced at him curiously before returning to their conversation.

The fireplace next to him spat out Fudge, who kept his balance. "Come," he ordered, leading the way to a phone booth on one end. He pushed Sam inside first, then got in himself. It was a tight fit, but they managed. Fudge contorted his arm to dial a number Sam couldn't see, and the booth moved upward.

They got out in a side alley of a city. "This way," Fudge ordered, walking off.

Was he _joking?_ Sam was wearing a _cloak,_ and he was pretty sure they'd just entered normal territory. He pulled it off and folded it until it could pass for a jacket draped over his arm. He also lost the green-and-silver tie, which he shoved into his pocket, and undid his top button. So dressed, he could follow Fudge attracting far less attention that the Minister himself did in his ridiculously bright outfit.

They stopped in a park. Fudge scanned the park and muttered, "They should be meeting us here."

"What do they-" Sam began, but was cut off.

"There," he said, pointing. Two women, a blonde and a brunette, were walking toward them holding hands. Their weapons were hidden well enough Sam couldn't see any at first glance, but the way they were walking told him they both had knives tucked into their jeans at the smalls of their backs.

"Sam Winchester," Fudge said when the women reached them, "these are Lianne and Christina." He pointed at each as he introduced them.

"Hi," Lianne said, reaching out to shake his hand. This close, he could see her eyes were green. 

"It's nice to meet you," Christina added, smiling kindly. Her brown eyes matched her hair color almost exactly. They were both wearing little, if any, make-up.

"You too," Sam said, smiling back at them.

"They told us you weren't new to this, but not how long you've been working," Christina said.

"Uh, I was raised in it, actually," Sam said, settling into a stance he could hold for hours before growing tired. "Started training at seven, first job at eight. Woman in white. So it's been about three years."

"How high's your count?"

Sam blew out a breath and thought back. "Um...solo or team?"

Lianne and Christina exchanged glances. "Both," Lianne said.

"Um. Usually a job every two weeks, for three years, so that's, what, seventy-eight? But sometimes I didn't go along, and sometimes it was a group, so, um, something up there. You?"

"We've only been together for two years," Christina said. "But Lianne's been hunting longer, she's the one who taught me. I've done about fifty."

"I was raised in it, so." Lianne shrugged. "Started actively at fourteen." She glanced around, lowered her voice, and said, "What and when was your last?"

"Halloween," Sam said. "Troll got in to the school. Had a three-inch blade and three kids in the room with me."

"We just got off a kelpie," Christina said.

"Yuck." Sam wrinkled his nose.

"You ever done one of those?" Lianne asked.

"Nope. I've heard of them, though. You have to stick your hand down its throat to get its heart, right?"

"Yeah. Rip it out still beating. You okay, Minister?"

Sam glanced to his side and fought down a laugh. Fudge was turning the same shade of green as his hat. "I'm fine," he said curtly.

"You're a fighter, not a lover?" Lianne asked, smirking. Christina took Lianne's hand again.

Fudge glared. "Something like that. Do we have a deal? You'll take the boy for the summer?"

Sam fought to keep his face impassive as the women considered him. "Yeah," Christina said finally. "He can come with us."

Sam sagged in relief. After the initial burst of hesitation, he'd adjusted to the idea of hunting over the summer, and his curiosity had grown. Now that he'd actually met the women, he was sure it would be very different hunting with the two of them than it was with his family.

"We should get Winchester back to school," Fudge said, though he'd made no mention of a time limit to Sam.

"Of course," Christina said. "It was nice to meet you, Sam."

"You, too," he managed.

"We'll meet you outside the platform on July first," Lianne told him.

"Can't wait," Sam answered, already being pulled away by Fudge.


	10. The End

The next weeks flew by. Sam turned twelve, an event that passed unnoticed and unremarked upon by his classmates. Draco lost them twenty points for being out of bed at night; Gryffindor lost a grand total of a hundred and fifty for Harry, Hermione, and Neville all being out on the same night. When they passed the hourglasses in the foyer that marked the tally, at first everyone thought it had been a mistake, but then the truth came out. The older Slytherins clapped and whistled when they passed Harry in the hallway, yelling, "Thanks, Potter, we owe you one!" Most of Sam's year didn't, possibly because they knew Sam would get angry at them the same way he got angry at Draco for similar actions, but Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle lost no opportunity to jeer.

The points weren't the only punishment: Draco, Harry, Hermione, and Neville all had to serve detention in the Forbidden Forest. Draco came back crying and bawling about cloaks and unicorns. He served detention with Snape right up until exams for running back to the castle in the middle of his assigned punishment, and came back after curfew every night smelling like pickled toads.

They needed those toads for the Potions final - a Forgetfulness Potion. Flitwick made them dance a pineapple across his desk. McGonagall had them turn a mouse into a make-up box; the prettier it was, the more points they got. History of Magic was an hour-long ordeal of answering questions about Gaspard Shingleton and the goblin wars. Herbology was half-theory, half-practical. With their Defense exam cancelled because Quirrell had disappeared (rumor claimed he'd been killed by Harry Potter, a claim which Sam was skeptical of), the Slytherins' last exam was Astronomy, which involved reading star charts and making their own.

The day after their final exam was the final Quidditch game of the semester - Slytherin against Gryffindor. Sam appreciated the symmetry of ending the year with the same teams they'd begun it with. Slytherin won easily, cementing them first place in the House Cup and winning them the Quidditch Cup.

The day after the Quidditch match was the last day of the semester. The Great Hall was decked in green and silver to celebrate Slytherin's win. All of them laughed and cheered and congratulated each other on a year well done, and even Draco had something less than contempt in his face when Dumbledore began to speak.

"Another year gone! And I must trouble you with an old man's wheezing waffle before we sink our teeth into our delicious feast. What a year it has been! Hopefully your heads are all a little fuller than they were...you have the whole summer ahead to get them nice and empty before next year starts.　

"Now, as I understand it, the house cup here needs awarding, and the points stand thus: In fourth place, Gryffindor, with three hundred and twelve points; in third, Hufflepuff, with three hundred and fifty-two; Ravenclaw has four hundred and twenty-six, and Slytherin, four hundred and seventy- two."

Everyone at the Slytherin table clapped and cheered. Malfoy banged his empty cup repeatedly; Sam was annoyed by it, but he did his best to ignore it. Millie hugged him enthusiastically on one side, Theo on the other, two warm bodies pressing against him in happiness, and Sam suddenly had something to consider.

"Yes, yes, well done, Slytherin," said Dumbledore. Millie and Theo let go. "However, recent events must be taken into account."

"Recent events?" Sam whispered.

Blaise shrugged. "Maybe the rumors are true?"

"He's getting points for killing Quirrell? That's likely," Sam said sarcastically.

"Ahem," said Dumbledore. "I have a few last-minute points to dish out. Let me see. Yes. First, to Mr. Ronald Weasley. For the best-played game of chess Hogwarts has seen in many years, I award Gryffindor house fifty points."

The Gryffindor table went nuts. The Slytherins looked at each other in confusion. _Chess?_ Why was Dumbledore awarding points for _chess?_

"Second, to Miss Hermione Granger. For the use of cool logic in the face of fire, I award Gryffindor house fifty points."

Confusion ratcheted up another notch. Dawning comprehension showed on Millie's face. "The rumors are true," she hissed. "Dumbledore hid a stone and the Gryffindors saved it from someone."

"Third - to Mr. Harry Potter, for pure nerve and outstanding courage, I award Gryffindor house sixty points."

Gryffindors cheered again. Sam quickly did the math, but Pansy beat him to it. "We're tied," she whispered. The Slytherins looked at each other in disbelief; Dumbledore handing out just enough house points at the end of the semester to tie them smacked of favoritism.

When the room fell quiet again, Dumbledore said, "It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to our enemies, but just as much to stand up to our friends. I therefore award ten points to Mr. Neville Longbottom."

The Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs, and Ravenclaws all cheered. At the Gryffindor table, Neville disappeared under a dogpile.

While the rest of the school celebrated, the Slytherins stared at each other in mute shock. Sam felt himself slowly growing angry. "This is bull," he growled.

"What?" Pansy yelled, cupping a hand to her ear.

"I said, it's bull!" Sam said, louder, talking over Dumbledore as the decorations changed from green to red. "Whatever they did they did _three days ago._ Why would he wait this long except to make a scene?"

He saw the change on their faces as what he said sunk in. They went from disappointed to angry as the full force hit them: this was a slap in the face. They'd _earned_ those points, they'd _earned_ that victory, and with a wave of his hand in the most humiliating way possible, Dumbledore had taken it away.

They were still simmering as they crossed the lake in the boats the next day, on the train on their way back to Kings Cross, and through their farewells. Sam left through the brickway and forced a smile for Lianne and Christina, who were waiting for him as promised.

"Have a good year?" Christina asked.

"Yeah," Sam said. "Passed everything. So where to?"

"Just outside London to the south," Lianne said. "Got something weird, but we're not sure what it is yet."

"Awesome," Sam said, meaning it. He wanted to make something bleed. "Lead the way."


End file.
